Waking up to Java: why risk managers need J2EE: integration, open standards and IBM's backing favor Sun Microsystems, platform

Risk & Insurance, Sept 1, 2003 by Jim Haley, Mike Ratliff

Because our company serves the property and casualty insurance marketplace exclusively, choosing J2EE as our new product strategy was a critical decision. The more we looked at J2EE, the more we liked what we saw.

Survey the insurance industry's software solutions and you'll find a predominance of IBM products. From small to large insurers, IBM solutions are out there generating transactions, running claims and underwriting operations, managing prospects and sales, tracking policies, and managing accounts and clients.

Today, IBM is making a significant commitment to J2EE and has one of the industry leading J2EE implementations in Websphere. Consider the insurance industry's enormous investment in IBM technologies such as AS/400, OS/390 and others and it's clear a J2EE strategy will yield the highest ROI numbers.

J2EE is robust and agile, and offers the ability to integrate technologies. It also offers compatibility among applications and open standards. J2EE offers many integration choices using Java Message Service, Java Connector Architecture and Internet Inter Orb Protocol. Given its array, J2EE is well positioned for demanding integration needs. In an industry layered with a multitude of applications, J2EE's integration strength offers insurance carriers and brokers manageable risk strategies.

J2EE also offers platform compatibility thanks to its specification-based approach. Defining a common specification and letting vendors compete on implementation quality leads to diverse platform, operating system and network support. Applications built on one platform can collaborate with applications built on different platforms. A certification program also assures current processes will continue to bring the highest compatibility standards in the industry.

The J2EE platform offers complete and robust model options even as it addresses back-end integration and high-end middle-tier business logic. Java, which resides at this model's core, has attracted some of the best programming minds in the business and this loyal following has driven the language's evolution beyond the boundaries of other programming languages.

And family, thanks in part to the Java Community Process, Java and the J2EE platform rapidly gained widespread adoption and innovation. J2EE will never suffer "brain drain" because Java's open process funnels rich ideas from a continually growing intellectual pool accessible to any organization at any time and often at no cost.

Sure, the insurance industry will continue to minimize technology risks but we believe the industry is poised to make widespread technology strategy changes nevertheless. Technology transitions will be deliberate and gradual. Insurance companies will capitalize on previous investments and will not risk their entire business by introducing sweeping technology changes throughout their corporations. New solutions managed by existing sets of skills must be able to run on existing infrastructures and talk to diverse legacy applications. Because movement to a new technology must complement existing technology investments. J2EE is sitting pretty. It complements existing hardware architectures and databases, and coexists with the enterprise solutions driving the vast majority of insurance business.

J2EE offers a choice of applications, delivers a strong cadre of industry leaders and business partners, and provides a deep pool of technical resources. That it offers users open sources is icing on the cake. We needed a technology that gains the immediate acceptance by current and future customers, one guaranteeing future and ongoing improvements, and one capable of setting new industry standards. J2EE fits the bill and meets the criteria. At Taliant Software, we strongly believe J2EE will set the bar for excellence in insurance solutions.

Jim Haley is chief marketing officer of Taliant Software and Mike Ratliff is J2EE development manager for the company.