TCi and AIT Partner on Life Offering

The systems integration challenges that are facing numerous life insurance companies have created an opportunity for life industry consultant TCi Consulting & Research (Cresskill, NJ) and financial services CRM provider AIT (Meriden, CT). In a deal that will combine TCi's knowledge of life insurance and annuities and AIT's Portrait Suite technology (which facilitates customer, distributor, employee and business partner interactions across channels including telephone, Internet, intranet and wireless device), the two companies will offer an integration solution for the life insurance and annuities industries. The partnership "is a case of the total being greater than the sum of its parts," according to George Lindsey, director of marketing, TCi Consulting and Research.

The idea for the alliance grew out of a conversation that took place two years ago between Rory Channer, AIT's vice president of business development, and John Johnsen, a TCi managing director. Channer describes TCi as "a consulting firm that knows the industry like no other consulting firm."

"TCi was engaged in client assignments and was looking for middleware solutions," relates Channer. "It couldn't find a company that fit the bill." According to TCi's Johnsen, applying the same vendor product evaluation principles that the consultant uses in its life company engagements, it decided to partner with the AIT.