FAST is a FinTech company located in Iselin, NJ founded by the former leaders of NaviSys. Since the beginning, Fast has focused on building the company with the best people, including top talents from leading software vendors and consulting firms.
FAST is helping insurers (life, annuity, P&C carriers) innovate and prepare for the uncertainty of the future in the digital world. Insurance carriers must transform their businesses to compete in the new digital world. In order to be competitive in just a few years, insurers need business agility and product flexibility. It is reminiscent of how other industries have been transformed. They need to be able to satisfy the needs of the next generation of customer and distribution expectations by creating new products more quickly, offering lower pricing options, and creating a far better experience for customers. Insurers need to be prepared for the future and be able to react.
FAST is taking the risk out of insurance transformation by combining its innovative core software with a new way of delivering it. To truly get to the new digital world, insurers must have the right foundation in place with the right core systems. Flexible Architecture, Simplified Technology (FAST) is dedicated towards removing barriers and creating opportunities for growth. They want to significantly accelerate innovation rather than stifle it.
With FAST, insurers can implement products up to 10x faster than traditional means. This gives them the ability to incubate products, test them in the market, get feedback, and iterate, all for a fraction of what it takes on other systems. In addition to the record-breaking speed to market, product designers have no boundaries or limits to what they can try with their products. Lastly, by connecting data analytics to the process, insurers iterating quickly will be able to hone in and know what their customers really want, when they want it, and how they want it. This will change how they think about what they sell in the future and give them the ability to either anticipate or react to the demands of the market.
Because of the uniqueness of the software and completely new way of delivering it, FAST is able to significantly reduce and shift the risk of implementing the software. FAST has proven to live up to the hype by cutting implementation times and costs by more than 75% with customers realizing tangible benefits much faster.
About the Team
Tom Famularo is the CEO of FAST, who has never been satisfied with surface level understanding and has always been driven to understand underlying mechanics. As a young child, he taught himself how to build video games, which sparked his passion for software and helped Tom develop a fundamental understanding of computers. In college, Tom landed into his first IT job as a midnight mainframe operator. Within 3 months he automated most of his tasks so he could make better use of his time.
Tom’s passion for reducing inefficiency, coupled with his deep understanding of software, drove him to become head of Product Development at NaviSys, where he and his team built the leading life and annuity system. NaviSys was acquired by Accenture in 2006, and Tom became the head of Product Development for all Life systems there.
Tom started FAST because he wanted to change how the industry implements and uses technology to prepare for the unknown, exciting future ahead. At FAST, Tom has overall responsibility for the strategy and ongoing operations.
“We think business intelligence and analytics will be key to helping you to determine what products you will sell, to whom you will sell them and how to find your customer at the exact time they want/need to buy insurance,” asserts Tom.
Valuable Services
Through a combination of the software and the services offered, FAST’s customers have been able to break records for speed and cost for implementations of its core Policy Admin System. Over the past 2 years, 6 customers have implemented in 10 months or less (averaging 6 months). This compares to an 18-month industry average and an average cost that is less than 30%.
In addition to innovative software, FAST also provides the following services:
Consulting Services – FAST offers both advisory and support in the following areas:
- Solution architecture – helping companies figure out the best way and roadmap to implement and integrate the technology to align with their business objectives.
- Program Management – executing and overseeing the implementation of the roadmap/program.
- Conversion – migrating onto new platforms while retiring the legacy.
- Project level consulting – testing, integration, business process management/re-engineering, etc.
Implementation Services – FAST can take on the entire implementation or train its customers to be self-sufficient and do it themselves.
Simplifying the Insurance Business
Team FAST recognizes flaws in existing insurance software and are driven to create a groundbreaking product to fill the chasm. FAST achieves this through cutting-edge product configuration tools that put control into the hands of people who understands the product the best. This, coupled with pre-built business components (policy administration, distribution management, case management), allows for efficient stand up of new products and conversion of legacy products. They offer a unique combination of software and expertise that enables them to be the alternative to large packaged software. FAST’s goal as a company is to make technology a tool for insurance companies, not a burden.
From the start, FAST’s philosophy was to create a solution that was simple and reduces complexity for insurance companies. FAST wanted to build software that both solves current customer roadblocks and puts customers in a position where they can quickly and easily react to unforeseen future market pressures. One of FAST’s recent clients implemented the FAST system and stood up a new product in three months, illustrating the platform’s ease of configuration and efficiency in getting a product to market.
Beyond the Horizon
As technology quickly advances, insurance companies that cling to legacy platforms will become obsolete. Legacy platforms don’t allow for easy or cost-effective innovation. To survive in the next generation of insurance, companies must be able to quickly and efficiently stand up new products. FAST is the software that will take insurance companies into the future by giving them the tools required to quickly pivot. Team FAST sees themselves right in the center of the biggest technology revolution in the industry has ever seen.
Helping Clients to Implement Blockchain
The initial design of FAST’s architecture anticipated emerging technologies like blockchain. The ability to de-couple data from processing and establish the appropriate relationships without limitations provides the ability for FAST to take advantage of the blockchain. Obviously, the application of blockchain within insurance is in its early stages (as insurance is lagging other financial services), but the FAST architecture is helping companies prepare.
Strategies for Future
FAST will continue to work on “future proofing” its customers by giving them the tools they need to configure any type of product, use data analytics and connect to the entire internet as its database in order for them to figure out what is next.
