Project Summary 

The Allianz Group is one of the world's leading insurers and asset managers with over 100 million customers in more than 70 countries. Their wide array of offerings includes products, services, and solutions in business, property, health and life insurance, asset management, and risk consulting. 

Allianz began the rollout of a new digital customer experience with the redesign and rebuild of its global loyalty program web application, Allianz Vorteilsprogramm. It was a step in an ambitious effort to position Allianz as a fintech leader in the digital space.

A robust loyalty program software called Allianz Vorteilsprogramm was built using Decoupled Drupal architecture with Drupal serving the backend and Angular taking care of the frontend. 

OpenSense Labs helped Allianz create a robust digital footprint with its reward loyalty program web application that resonates with customers and prospects alike. 

The new platform enhances business performance with a range of rewards that take Allianz a step closer to a complete digital commerce experience.
 

Project Highlights

• Quick customization capabilities added making third-parties integration quick
• The customer base grew to over a million and infrastructure costs were reduced.

Objectives 

The goal was to create a headless architecture that could effectively address the shortcomings of their previous loyalty program. The plan included integrating multiple suppliers and fulfillment providers through a centralized dashboard and implementing Prime Cloud, a top-performing software for exceptional loyalty programs, as a high-performance, enterprise-grade SaaS solution. Additionally, the objective was to transform Allianz into an API provider for third-party solutions, allowing them to access data without connecting directly to the source.

In addition to the previously mentioned objectives, a crucial requirement was to have the ability to scale rapidly as the platform was expected to launch highly sought-after items such as limited Soccer tickets for Allianz Arena.
 

Process and Solutions

Powerful architecture

Due to the complexity and the sensitivity, microservices architecture was chosen to be implemented. The entire application was broken down into multiple loosely coupled component operating independently and asynchronously:

• Centralised Identity manager for Authentication
• Loyality Point and Transaction management System
• Frontend Angular app
• Commerce
• Segment Builder
• API Manager for third-parties
• Fulfillers
• Campaign and Communication manager
• Reporting and Dashboard
   

Essential Features

The improved loyalty program effectively provided incentives to loyal customers in the form of vouchers, which could be redeemed as needed. The management of user points and the point rules engine were made separate services for improved reliability. To ensure a smooth experience for customers when navigating between systems, Single Sign-On (SSO) was implemented using Allianz's Centralized Identity management.

Depending on the type of product being purchased, transactions with different fulfillment providers were made. A regular check was performed to ensure proper account keeping and to flag any orders that required attention. In some cases, customers were also able to browse the fulfillment providers' application and make purchases. To maintain consistency, Drupal was used as an API provider and provided different versions of APIs based on the needs of the third party, eliminating the need for development at the PrimeCloud end. 

Additionally, web accessibility (AA) planning, ongoing penetration testing, security fixes, and load testing were implemented to ensure high security and an intuitive user experience for Allianz employees and other entities worldwide. The Allianz's own design language, NDBX, was also utilized to deliver a cohesive experience.

Efficient team collaboration

The successful implementation of such a complex project required seamless coordination and communication among multiple teams and agencies, from Design to DevOps. User stories and designs were shared as part of the product backlog, and our team helped define them from a technical perspective and conducted a POC (Proof of Concept) to assess feasibility. Once we had sufficient stories, we organized sprints and began development.

We adhered to agile processes and divided the site into various independently deployable services, overseeing the progress of each one sequentially. After three phases of thorough development spanning over 1.2 years, the project was finally released.

Outcome

OpenSense Labs leveraged their technical expertise and creative prowess to redesign and rebuild the application using decoupled architecture. In addition, customers are now able to access the Allianz benefits program from their smartphones and tablets, which have also been optimized for mobile view.

• After the re-platforming of the loyalty program, the portal was able to handle large traffic spikes with ease and support over 5k concurrent users. 
• The success of the revamped portal was immediately apparent, with up to 1000 orders placed by customers on the first day. 
• The customer base grew to over a million and infrastructure costs were reduced.