Revol One Financial® and Genpact prove greenfield is a route to rapid innovation

Insurers are finally showing signs of overcoming decades of technical and process debt to drive digital transformation across their core service lines. Yet for many, this is merely the start of a long journey—leaving large segments of the industry open to disruption. While some organizations are still battling debts, savvy firms have realized that adopting a greenfield approach from the ground up can be a much faster route to driving innovation.

Annuities is one market with substantial technical and process debt, burdened by manual processes and long turnaround times. Recognizing this, Revol One Financial has joined forces with Genpact to rapidly rebuild itself from the ground up with a greenfield approach, emerging as a cloud-native carrier with the power to disrupt the annuities market in just ten months.

Revol One Financial saw an opportunity in annuities—and the fastest route to value is a ground-up approach

Established in 1980, Revol One Financial evolved steadily into an insurance provider and, like many of its industry peers, accrued extensive technical and process debt over the years. In 2022, Axar Capital Management acquired the carrier and rebranded it to the current name. By bringing together a leadership team with deep industry knowledge and more than 200 years of collective executive experience, it formulated a compelling vision for the future of Revol One Financial. In the words of its chief executive officer:

Our vision for the tech-driven platform was all about speed and agility—delivering products faster and providing financial professionals and distributors the products and tools they need to meet market demands and better service their customers.

— Mark Zesbaugh, CEO, Revol One Financial

The company’s executives realized that the experience of financial professionals is often overlooked, yet holds an opportunity to differentiate. To do this, they chose to modernize from scratch as a digital native without technical and process debt, effectively selecting a greenfield implementation. As Bob explained:

I call this the revenge of insurance technology nerds. I spent my career on legacy tech, and this is 100% cloud, 100% modern, and 100% agile.

— Bob Guilmette, Chief Information Officer, Revol One Financial

A greenfield approach enabled speed and agility rather than battling technical and process debt—and Genpact was the partner of choice

Building on its theme of speed and agility with an aim to launch the new business within twelve months, Revol One Financial Genpact fit the bill as a strategic partner that ensures cost optimization. The decision was made, albeit cautiously.

Genpact’s extensive understanding of the insurance market meant no time was wasted in getting up to speed, operating nearly as a partner and project owner. Bob said this was key to the project’s success and was only possible due to Genpact’s strong understanding of Revol One Financial’s vision.

In past projects, service providers have given me exactly what I asked for—nothing more, nothing less. Genpact owned the delivery; they chased my people, planned ahead, and helped us make better decisions.

— Bob Guilmette, Chief Information Officer, Revol One Financial

Genpact’s blend of nearshore and offshore presence enabled round-the-clock operations, with multiple teams—including core integration and data transformation, call center setup, and financial systems teams—working in parallel across different facets of the business.

Revol One Financial has a handful of live products in the US, but they’re not done yet

The outcome of this mammoth effort is that Revol One Financial went to market as a new cloud-based annuity provider in just ten months—a proof point for other enterprises that greenfield can be the best option. Financial professionals were liberated from slow manual processes, instead using real-time data to support clients much faster—achieving their goal of speed and agility. Moreover, Revol One Financial’s willingness to establish itself as a startup showed it has the digital-first infrastructure needed to fully capitalize on the rewards of automation-fueled innovation.

When asked for advice on other enterprises considering a fresh start like Revol One’s, Bob explained:

I would say to any legacy enterprise, start your own startup. Treat new products as a startup, partitioned from your legacy technology. It’s a golden age of technology—don’t waste it!

—Bob Guilmette, Chief Information Officer, Revol One Financial

The Bottom Line: Adopting a greenfield approach was a rapid route to innovation for Revol One Financial—and it could be for your business too.

Launching an annuity business in just ten months is no small feat and difficult to replicate. Yet, Revol One Financial and Genpact’s success should encourage enterprises across industries to rethink whether siloed and piecemeal transformation efforts can truly drive innovation. As Bob advises: starting your own startup, creating new products and services as new digital-native operators, and then expanding from there can be worth it. At the same time, enterprises must know that this approach demands significant upfront investment, high-risk tolerance, and access to exceptional talent pools to succeed.