LIXI™ News

LIXI Welcome pack

Do you need help explaining LIXI to new staff, or finding your way through the information provided? LIXI has now published a new welcome guide for LIXI members. It is not intended to be a full user manual but has been designed to make those first steps a less daunting prospect.

Click here to download the guide.

 

SURVEY AND RESEARCH ON THE COSTS OF SETTLEMENT AND SAVINGS WITH ELECTRONIC INTEGRATION

The Board has commissioned a research project to assess the potential cost savings from the development and implementation of a standard national electronic conveyancing system.

The first LIXI white paper in 2008 ‘Enabling Efficiency’ studied the problems and costs associated with rework in mortgage origination and identified the significant savings that can be achieved.  This provided members with valuable information to support their business cases for project implementation. 

The aim of this second research white paper is to provide vital information for the major banks to gain project budget approval, by highlighting the potential benefits of electronic integration in conveyancing. The research will be conducted by independent organisation Brand Management.

We anticipate that preliminary results will be available for discussion at the LIXI Evening Series in Melbourne on May 26 and Sydney in June.  A final white paper highlighting the results and key findings for the industry will be presented at the LIXI Annual Forum in Sydney on September 9.

 

LIXI Board 2009 Strategy Session

Each year the LIXI Board holds a half-day strategy session, to establish and refresh action plans for the coming year to correspond with a three year strategic plan. This is also an opportunity for new board members to inject fresh thinking into the process and influence the direction of LIXI.

This year the session was held on January 28th, and was facilitated by Chris Richards of Richards Consulting. Chris has an accumulated wealth of experience facilitating executive and senior management groups ranging from government departments to small and large businesses, including in the financial sector.

The board reviewed LIXI's operations, performance and industry involvement over the past couple of years to identify the areas to be targeted for development and effort. Several particular areas stood out, including Engaging Industry at a higher level; reviewing Funding alternatives; Standards Development - both member-driven and of course with our biggest project of the next couple of years, NECS; and reviewing the development Methodology. These initiatives will all be driven of a foundation of communication, including the Evening Series events, Advisory Panels, and of course the most influential conference on the industry calendar, the Annual LIXI Forum.

 

Products Distribution Advisory Panel

LIXI held an Advisory Panel discussion on 25 November, kindly hosted by the Pisces Group at their new head office. The panelists included Ganesh Radhakrishnan (Smartline), Vincent Turner (Pisces), Eric Handbury (IRESS), Tim Hibberd (Smart Services CRC), Joanne Reid (Solution4) and Jim McVey (NAB). Aggregators and industry service providers were well represented, however the lenders were rather under-represented. St George Bank and NABbroker were present and provided valuable contributions to a lively discussion.

The panel and audience discussed various factors around the distribution of lending product rates and fees to recipients – aggregators and application service providers. Debate revolved around the potential for a third party intermediary versus the support of lenders to provide this information themselves.

The aggregators universally agreed that there will be real and realizable benefits with products data distribution, particularly in the areas of accuracy and timeliness to market, in the light of imminent regulation. Cost efficiencies would be available in the current context, with potential for more efficiencies as the standard expands to cover the complete product information set. 

All LIXI members are welcome to participate in the Products Distribution discussions, for further information contact

LIXI AGM Connects the Way for the Future

LIXI held its Annual General Meeting (AGM) in Sydney on 13 Nov 2008, capping off a year of major developments for the group.

LIXI CEO Erik Fenna said that the AGM and the Evening Series strategy session that followed reaffirmed that LIXI was not just on the right track in the eyes of its members, but was setting a new path for leadership in the industry.

“LIXI received some tremendous feedback from our members. Our work on technical projects and issues surrounding intellectual property and funding all received strong endorsement from the membership base,” said Mr Fenna

“With a LIXI Board member hosting each table of the Evening Series discussions, we received a very high level of constructive contributions. The output from each group allowed the Board, especially our newly elected directors, to garner a wide range of industry feedback and to obtain a broader view.”

“The clearest message we received is that LIXI members are pressing LIXI for more direct assistance with implementation. We are hearing this very strongly,” said Mr Fenna.

“Assistance from consulting or direct implementation services is a clear growth path for us. Even more so, the LIXI membership is expressing a view that LIXI does have a role in this and is not just a standards body.”

The LIXI Board elections saw the return of all seven sitting members including Chairman John Hearne. Three new members join the Board as well. The following directors were elected for 2009:

Curtis Brager – NextGen.Net*
Chris Carn - nabbroker
Nick Carr - Allette
John de la Torre – The Home Loan Centre*
Simon Elwig - CBA
John Hearne – QBE LMI
Simon Libbis – NECS*
Joanne Mather – Mortgage Choice
Phil Naylor - MFAA
Mike Thanos - LTX
* denotes newly elected

Former Directors, Sean O’Brien and Neil Edwards, who retired at this AGM, we thanked for their contribution to LIXI by the Board and Chief Executive.

The AGM caps off a highly successful year for LIXI that has seen the appointment of Erik Fenna as the organisation’s first full time CEO. As well membership and licensing revenues have increased by around 15% year on year. LIXI’s reach into the industry is growing organically, now with over 100 member participants -  up 20% on last year.

LIXI Industry Forum 2008: Highlighting the value of standards in a changing mortgage landscape

Following on from the success of the 2007 Forum, the second annual LIXI Industry Forum was held on Wednesday 10th September at The Westin in Sydney.

Around 250 delegates gathered to discuss the current industry challenges and the role of LIXI in helping to achieve the efficiencies required for the future success of the Australian mortgage industry.

Presentation highlights of the event included:

• A keynote address focused on the international business perspective of the critical role standards play in global financial markets, presented by Stephen Farrage of SWIFT

• A summary presentation of the whitepaper research commissioned by LIXI to identify the economic benefit of LIXI standards to the industry.

• The lively panel discussions between leading lenders and broker groups discussing the current state of play and the path forward in a very challenging market environment

• An insight into the approach new CEO, Erik Fenna will take in leading LIXI through 2009 and beyond

• An update from Simon Libbis, Executive Director of NECO on the National Electronic Conveyancing System that is expected to be in place by March 2010

• An overview of the important role of settlement and post settlement standards from Mike Abel at Perpetual.

The success of the day can be attributed to a number of key outcomes, including:

• The approach taken by many participants in understanding the role of LIXI and a higher level of acceptance of the benefits of using standards within the industry

• The positive news that a number of major projects currently underway in member businesses will use LIXI standards

• The identification of the opportunities for members to play a role in the implementation of the standards at various stages in the process

• The commitment to the development of an electronic mortgage documentation and management process via NECS and organisations such as Perpetual

• The opportunities provided during the day to network with members and other industry participants, contributing to the development of the LIXI community

The Board and CEO Erik Fenna are looking forward to discussing these outcomes and the feedback we received at the next Board meeting on 18th September. We certainly learnt a great deal from the day and will ensure the objectives and priorities for LIXI in 2009 reflect these outcomes and form the foundation for the continued growth of LIXI during the next phase of the Australian mortgage industry.

Many thanks to all our speakers, event sponsors NextGen, LTX, NAB Broker, Fuji Xerox, Sandstone, Thunderhead, Commonwealth Bank and PMI Insurance and to all who attended to make the event such a success.

We look forward to seeing you at the next LIXI event.

Two new LIXI standards are ready for business

Two important new LIXI standards have completed development and are now available for download and use by members:

LIXI CAL 1.4 extends the Credit Application Language to explicitly support applications for non-conforming loans and equity release (or “reverse mortgage”) loans.

LIXI Commissions 1.1 is a major re-write of the original Commissions standard that we believe delivers a practical, functional solution to a business problem that currently creates endless headaches for both brokers and lenders. With help from Microsoft we are planning a to provide a Reference Implementation of LIXI Commissions in the near future. As usual the Reference Implementation will be available free to all LIXI members.

 

Yet another new LIXI standard is now ready for business

After a long gestation the LIXI Products standard has finally been released for general use. LIXI Products 1.3 is a schema for describing key characteristics of mortgage lending products. It’s intended use is the timely online update of product information held by third parties - in particular the databases maintained by mortgage brokers.

 

LIXI Banner Advertising

LIXI has been firmly established as the number one business enabler in the Lending market by delivering major benefits to the organisations that embed it in their processing activities. LIXI’s reputation also attracts interest from non-members wishing to join, other similar industries and a raft of overseas companies and standards bodies.

LIXI website visitors span the full range of the corporate structure, from CEO’s to Operations Managers and Developers. Their interests are focused on, based on their page visiting patterns, the role of LIXI in the industry, working papers and case studies, the LIXI@Work newsletter, software, the latest news and who is a member of LIXI.

Some LIXI members have asked if we could provide some banner space on the LIXI website for advertising by LIXI members. The LIXI Board has considered this request and has decided to release two areas on the LIXI website for banner advertising. The LIXI Banner Advertising document gives you a brief background and site stats to help you with your business case in securing this valuable resource. You can then download the LIXI Banner Advertising Agreement, fill-it in and send it to us.