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By Steve Ranger, 4 January 2007 15:40

Savings bank ING Direct has completed its largest tech project in the UK, using offshore developers to help with the introduction of its first mortgage product.

Peter Knight, ING Direct's UK IT director, said the new product is the company's first foray into the mortgage market in the UK - a market already crowded with 60,000 mortgage products.

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He told silicon.com that the 18-month project was the largest programme the company has undertaken in the UK.

Knight explained: "We are in a fortunate position as a direct-to-market bank in not having a lot of legacy. Because we are relatively young in the UK market we've got an up-to-date architecture that we were able to build upon.

"We've had to add some components because we didn't want to build the mortgage application from scratch."

ING Direct used Capgemini to help with the integration of several major components and third-party interfaces. The system combines some components already deployed at ING Direct in Canada and also incorporates Omiga mortgage origination software from Vertex.

Capgemini was responsible for systems integration, building interfaces with ING Direct UK's accounting, banking, website and call centre systems and with external systems at credit agencies and solicitors.

Much of the Capgemini development work was carried out by staff at its centre in Mumbai.

Knight, who insisted making the offshore team feel part of the ING Direct team was important, said: "We reviewed the CVs and interviewed every person. We looked at everyone who was going to be working on the project."