"Depending on the line of business and focus area, there areprobably 15 to 20 [core solutions] vendors that are really competitive for the opportunities that come up. Amongthose competitive vendors, a lot of them are comparable in terms oftheir capabilities when it comes to configurability, first classarchitecture, and user interface.

There are maybe a top five to seven that we see consistentlychosen and getting the lion's share of new deals, but it reallydepends on the individual buyer. There are a lot of [vendors] thatmay not be competitive for a broad range of deals but areabsolutely the right choice for an individual deal.

We try to be skeptical for any abstract rating criteria thatprovide an absolute list of the best vendors in the space. Itreally depends on what the individual situation is. A vendor thatmay not make anyone's top 10 lists may be the best for anyindividual choice.

There definitely has been a serious improvement in the qualityof available solutions, certainly on the P&C side over the lastfive years. We saw a generation of solutions really mature in thelate 90s and the early part of the last decade. The generation thathas come of age over the last three to five years definitely hastremendous advantages over that previous generation."