Vendor Analysis
published on Nov 16, 2020
Report Overview:
This NelsonHall assessment analyzes Darwin ’s offerings and capabilities in Next Generation H&W Administration.
Who is this Report for:
NelsonHall’s Cloud HR Transformation Services profile on Darwin is a comprehensive assessment of Darwin offerings and capabilities, designed for:
- Sourcing managers monitoring the capabilities of existing suppliers of H&W Administration and identifying vendor suitability for H&W Administration RFPs
- Vendor marketing, sales, and business managers looking to managers developing strategies to target service opportunities and benchmark themselves against their peers
- Financial analysts and investors specializing in the H&W Administration sector.
Scope of this Report:
The report provides a comprehensive and objective analysis of Darwin’s H&W Administration services offerings and capabilities, and market and financial strengths, including:
- Identification of the company’s strategy, emphasis, and new developments
- Analysis of the company’s strengths, weaknesses, and outlook
- Revenue estimates
- Analysis of the profile of the company’s customer base including the company’s targeting strategy and examples of current contracts
- Analysis of the company’s offerings and key service components
- Analysis of the company’s delivery organization including the location of delivery locations.
Key Findings & Highlights:
This NelsonHall vendor assessment analyzes Darwin’s offerings and capabilities in H&W Administration services.
Darwin is a benefits technology company owned by Mercer. It was founded in the U.K. as Thomsons Online Benefits in 2000 with the aim of moving the very manual process of benefits administration online, through the Darwin platform. It has been delivering global benefit schemes since 2003. The company initially focused on the U.K. market, later in 2007, the company opened an office in Singapore and began to focus increasingly on addressing benefits administration for global multinationals.
In 2016, Darwin (named Thomsons at the time) was acquired by Mercer. Mercer itself has a long history in benefits administration services. In 1945, William M. Mercer, Ltd, was founded in Canada and grew to become a specialist provider of actuarial and benefits consulting services. Acquired by Marsh & McLennan Companies in 1959, its own employee benefits department merged with Mercer, and the firm expanded through growth and acquisition to become a global provider of health, retirement, investments, and talent services.
Mercer and Marsh (MMC’s insurance, broking and risk advisory business) created a single organization that includes consulting, broking, and technology called Mercer Marsh Benefits (MMB). Mercer Marsh Benefits places ~$80 billion of premiums a year and services, is based in 135 countries, and serves clients in ~ 160 countries. Their global employee benefits network of 9,000 consultants brings local knowledge to support integrated global solutions appropriate for each market. Darwin was added to this organization to combine the broking and consulting with an industry-leading tech
The organization combines the expertise of Mercer and Marsh consulting and broking businesses, coupled with the technology in the Darwin platform. While Darwin is a global platform, within each market, Darwin works as part of MMB with local providers, leveraging MMB's provider relationships, expertise, and innovations.
Darwin is 100% dedicated to the development, sales, and delivery of the Darwin platform. The company currently has ~800 personnel, spread across the U.K., U.S., Romania, Singapore, and services ~370 H&W clients. Clients include many major U.S. high-tech companies, financial services firms, large pharmaceutical companies, and increasingly large manufacturing conglomerates. Today it supports ~2m employees, and 4m lives when including employees’ dependants who are also on the platform.