Financing Kenya
Financing Ken Written by Nye Longman Produced by Mariana Lee
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Kenya Commercial Bank is not only making waves in East Africa for its competitive range of banking and financial services; it is also responsible for introducing millions to finance for the first time
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tarting life in 1896 as a branch of the National Bank of India, the Kenya Commercial Bank (KCB) is using over a century of experience as the leading bank in East Africa to make a positive and long-lasting contribution to the region. Maintaining a strong presence across the markets it serves, KCB is undergoing a wideranging technological transformation which is bringing about in-house efficiencies and delivering appreciable value for its customers. The changes it is currently undergoing are also enabling the Bank to expedite its efforts to include thousands of unbanked citizens across East Africa, as African Business Review explores.
Operations KCB offers a variety of banking and financial services, supporting the various needs of the steadily-growing economic region. Alongside its
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more traditional loans, mortgages, current accounts, and cards, KCB offers specialised Diaspora, money market, and foreign exchange capabilities. Listed on the Nairobi Stock Exchange (NSE) KCB’s ownership is made up mainly of locals, the Kenyan government (which holds a 17 percent stake), and a small selection of institutional investors from the US and Europe. Eager to capitalise on the increasingly widespread use of mobile telephones on the continent, the Bank has formed a variety of partnerships with
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major telcos and service providers a pragmatic growth strategy: “We in order to leave its mark on the are always looking at opportunities growing FinTech and mobile to grow, either through partnerships banking markets. Its or organically. We are M-Benki account open to partnering is particularly with larger notable for offering organisations who customers the have a similar growth ability to conduct strategy.” all of their banking Recognising that online via a mobile its capabilities and The year Kenya Commercial device. operational reach Bank was founded KCB represents are vast, KCB has the largest banking used its scope in network in Kenya; last order to include an year it recorded 250 ATMs in the unprecedented amount of East country. Its seven million account Africans into its financial services holders are spread across branches portfolio using microfinance. in Burundi, Rwanda, South “With our microloans, we added Sudan, Tanzania, and Uganda via about five million customers in nine nationally-focused companies months – most of these are people making up the KCB Group. that have never had a bank account. KCB’s Group CIO Avi Mitra One of the major steps we are taking explains that the company operates is to partner with the MasterCard
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FINANCE
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“Maintaining a strong presence across the markets it serves, KCB is undergoing a wide-ranging technological transformation which is bringing about in-house efficiencies and delivering appreciable value for its customers�
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Foundation to increase this financial inclusion. In this period we loaned out about $90 million, for loans that ranged from about half a dollar all the way up to $10,000,” says Mitra.
Technology transformation KCB is confident that technological innovation will be mutually beneficial for both the business and its customers, and is backing this up with serious monetary investment – it has spent $25 million over the past two years on modernising legacy systems. Keen to quickly modernise, the Bank went to the cloud: “We got rid of almost 95 percent of our clientserver environment and moved to the cloud. This has brought better efficiency, uptime, as well as agility towards time to market – it has impacted in a very positive way,” Mitra says. As a CIO, Mitra explains, it is
Avi Mitra
Chief Infomation Officer
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impossible to ignore the Internet that product. We’ll be adding more of Things – a trend which he features to that product in terms of firmly believes will be the next key savings, insurance and payments. disruptor in the digital Then it will become world. As an a value-add for organisation, KCB customers and the is keen to learn incentive to stay with what the current KCB will improve.” market has to offer He concludes: “My and how, in the not strategy is to move so distant future, more into digital Kenya Commercial Bank is money transfer is world of FinTech. I’m based in Nairobi going to transform trying to move the and disrupt the bank towards this and banking industry. at the same time become Aware of the ever-shifting nature much more agile in serving the of the FinTech space, Mitra explains customers. I want to un-shell the that KCB’s products are designed legacy behaviour and the previous with adaptability in mind: “We add company DNA. We are going to be many features which were not in the a more agile and forward-thinking, plan, so we are constantly maturing digitally-driven bank.”
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FINANCE
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6th floor Wing B City Hall Way, Kencom House Nairobi, Kenya + 254 (20) 2287000 +254 (732) 187001 Contactcentre@kcb.co.ke www.kcb.co.ke