Schuberg Philis provides infrastructure for Rabobank's International Internet Banks

Rabobank opens their third foreign internet bank in New-Zealand

Amsterdam, 16 February 2006 - Under the name RaboPlus, Rabobank opened an internet bank in Wellington, the capital of New Zealand last Tuesday. The customers in New Zealand can open a savings account and apply for other financial products. RaboPlus is the third Internet bank of Rabobank abroad, after the ones opened in Belgium (2002) and Ireland (2005). The major reason to open the online-bank is the need to attract capital in order to finance Rabobank's activities in New Zealand . Rabobank is active in New Zealand since 1994, mainly in the agricultural sector.

The internet bank offers the New Zealanders an attractive interest rate of 7,35 percent on a yearly basis, with no withdrawal restrictions. The high interest rate of RaboPlus is possible because of the lack of overhead costs. The bank has a small office with 14 employees in Wellington and makes use of the infrastructure and experience which Rabobank has developed for internet banking in the Netherlands , Belgium and Ireland in the past ten years. With 1.9 million active customers, Rabobank is the largest internet bank in Europe .

Michel Hofman, Head of Shared Services International Direct Banking (IDB), is responsible for the central organization as well as the daily IT and back-office operations of the international internet banks. In this way, the local management of the internet bank is able to focus on customer service and marketing for the local end customers. The shared service concept has been chosen very deliberately by installing a high available application infrastructure with integrated risk management processes in close co-operation with several external partners.

Hofman: “The art is to create a balance between operational continuity and the flexibility to make adjustments in a controlled but effective manner if necessary, while maintaining a very keen sense of costs. By making use of a specialized shared services center, a high measure of efficiency, rapidity and quality may be achieved, so that we can permanently meet the high banking and business requirements.”
This service model has proved itself in practice for some time now. Within a little more than one year, two new online banks have been installed successfully in Ireland and New Zealand, and the existing Belgian online bank has moved to the shared services center in the Netherlands . For organization and management of the online banks, Rabobank has selected the Dutch innovative outsourcing company Schuberg Philis at the end of 2004. Schuberg Philis focuses solely on total control of mission critical applications and infrastructures for companies who require a high measure of availability and professional risk management next to their ability to respond quickly and in a flexible manner to a changing business environment.

Pim Berger, Managing Director of Schuberg Philis, is very enthusiastic about the close co-operation within the Rabobank IDB shared services center. Berger: “Time and again, it is incredible to see how effective this model is, with the application partner of the banking software Callatay & Wouters, the Rabobank IDB team and Schuberg Philis offering their central services in an integrated approach to the different international operational internet banks. It is only possible to achieve such a high quality level with specialized parties.”

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For more information:
Karel Zwaan
T 020 582 98 29
M 06 533 09 571

About Schuberg Philis
Schuberg Philis is an innovative private company and a leading company in the field of mission critical outsourcing services. Schuberg Philis exclusively addresses company applications which require 24/7 availability and guarantees 100% uptime for such systems. Schuberg Philis the IT-auditable outsourcing company. For more information: www.schubergphilis.com .