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FEBRUARY 2019
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WELCOME
W
elcome to the launch edition of
and Thomas Quigley explain how the
FinTech Magazine!
risks involved in digital transformation can be successfully navigated.
As the finance industry continues to be disrupted by the advent of block-
Meanwhile, we sat down with software
chain and cryptocurrencies, cashless
solution provider Finastra’s Senior
payments and open banking, this new
Director, Smita Gupta, a powerful
brand aims to bring you the latest
woman in fintech who is responsible
insights from top-tier CTOs, CIOs
for the firm’s marketing across
and more.
the APAC region. Gupta discussed Finastra’s newly-launched open
We explore the digital transformation journeys of leading global businesses and find out how the experts
banking readiness index and how inancial institutions can best prepare for the future.
are navigating this exciting new financial landscape.
Be sure to check out our company reports on Santander, Generali,
Our cover star this month is global
Nationwide, Adyen and more, as well
insurance leader Marsh, which has
as our top 10 this month examining
just released its latest CMT (commu-
which fintech startups are the ones
nications, media and technology)
to watch in 2019.
study, outlining what the adoption of disruptive technologies like AI and
Enjoy the issue!
IoT will means for the industry. CMT
Olivia Minnock.
Practice Leaders Alexander Chao
Olivia.Minnock@bizclikmedia.com
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05
CONTENTS
12
NAVI GATI NG THE RISKS OF DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION WITH MARSH
30
40 : s t e g g u N
DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION FOR AN OPEN BANKING FUTURE FEBRUARY 2019
merging security ande convenienc through blockchain
50
62
SUPPORTING THE DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION OF FINANCE
70 84 TOP 10
GLOBAL EVENTS
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CONTENTS
118 Santander
88 AXA Singapore
104
138
Generali
Adyen
FEBRUARY 2019
154
188
Moneta
Truliant
170
200
Nationwide
Wipro Americas
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Covering every angle in the digital age The Business Chief platforms offer insight on the trends influencing C and V-level executives, telling the stories that matter
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12
G V NA I A
THE RIS DIGITAL TRAN WITH M
FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
T A I NG
SKS OF NSFORMATION MARSH WRIT TEN BY
L AUR A MULL AN PRODUCED BY
A LE X PAGE
w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
13
MARSH
14
AS THE FIRM UNVEILS ITS LATEST CMT RISK STUDY, WE SPEAK TO MARSH’S CMT PRACTICE LEADERS TO LEARN ABOUT THE RISKS BEHIND DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION AND HOW THESE CAN BE MANAGED
L
ast year, the speed of innova-
success, this transformation doesn’t
tion kept up its blistering pace
come without its risks.
– and we can expect nothing
This is where Marsh offers a helping
less in 2019. This rings true in particular
hand with its latest CMT Risk Study.
for the communications, media and
Surveying 200 of its CMT clients
technology (CMT) sector, where the
globally, the insurance heavyweight
adoption of technologies from artificial
has identified some of the risks which
intelligence (AI) to the Internet of Things
are hindering CMT companies in their
(IoT) is quickly becoming the norm.
transformation journeys. Alexander
Yet, whilst technology is increasingly
Chao, Asia Communications, Media
heralded as the key to business
& Technology Practice Leader, believes
FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
15
that one of the biggest hurdles revolves
to the back of the pack, making R&D
around R&D and financing. “The recent
mission critical. “They need to invest
market downturn, as well as the trade
heavily in R&D in order to find the most
war between the US and China, poses
advanced technology that will help
a great risk,” he observes. “Many
them survive in the CMT industry,” Chao
manufacturers, especially in Asia, have
adds. “If they make a wrong investment,
slowed down their capital expenditure
it will potentially cost a fortune and
because they don’t have a clear picture
generate a series of problems for the
of what the future holds.” Because the
CMT company.” Other issues like patent
sector is so innovation-driven, CMT
infringement or security could also
companies must keep up or risk dropping
hamper investment. w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
MARSH
“ T hey need to invest heavily in R&D in order to find the most advanced technology to help them survive in the CMT industry” 16
— Alexander Chao, Asia Communications, Media & Technology Practice Leader
The worries don’t end there: looking
hand, because CMT companies are
at the results for the 2019 CMT Risk
technology providers, they have liability
Survey, Thomas Quigley, US Comm-
if their technology fails to perform.
unications, Media & Technology
Whether it fails to ensure security or
Practice Leader, points out that the
simply doesn’t work as designed, it’s
top three risks identified by Marsh’s
a top liability risk.” Even if it is designed
clients are: data security and privacy;
well and is secure, there are still many
technology errors and omissions; and
ways technology can disappoint.
IT resiliency. “This shows why it’s so
“Maybe there’s an electronic interruption,
important to do a study specifically
maybe my backups didn’t work – there
for CMT companies,” he explains.
are several ways that technology can
“If you look across all industries, most
fail to work as intended,” notes Quigley.
respondents only talk about cyberattacks and data privacy. On the other FEBRUARY 2019
While some technology failures may seem minor, the ramifications of an
ASIA
increase in the types of errors can be devastating. As technology becomes ubiquitous, Quigley says that “the severity of technology failures gets greater and greater every day”. Whether the technology is being used to protect personal records or to improve the efficiency of manufacturing operations, a failure of any kind can stop a business in its tracks. “If the fintech which supports my trading platform goes down for 30 minutes, that could result in hundreds of millions of dollars in losses,” he says. “The more we depend upon technology, the larger the loss could be.” E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Alexander Chao joined Marsh Taiwan in 1998, and has almost 30 years of comprehensive experience in general insurance. Over the past 21 years, he has been servicing large clients in the high tech sector, offering advice in insurance program design, technical review, strategic risk review, and market relationship management. In 2016, Chao was appointed as the Regional Communications, Media and Technology Practice Leader for Asia, leveraging his deep expertise to spearhead business development initiatives throughout the region. Prior to joining Marsh, Chao started his career with MSIG Taiwan as the Head of Property Underwriting.
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17
MARSH
As the lines between the digital and physical become blurred, the consequences of technology failure are no longer just monetary: they could also be fatal. “We can also see bodily injury and property damage from technology failure,” highlights Quigley, citing autonomous vehicles as a relevant example. In previous years, if there was a car incident it was usually the driver’s fault but nowadays, this is quickly changing. “In autonomous vehicles, there are thousands of chips and millions of lines of code. As 18
autonomous mobility becomes more
“ A s autonomous mobility becomes more popular and as technology becomes commonplace in cars, it’s likely that liability will lie with the manufacturer” — Thomas Quigley, US Communications, Media & Technology Practice Leader
E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Thomas Quigley leads Marsh’s Communications, Media, and Technology (CMT) Practice in the United States. He ensures Marsh delivers to its clients a deep understanding of the forces driving opportunity and disruption for CMT companies, and the innovative solutions required to address their rapidly evolving risk profiles. Quigley provides seniorlevel oversight and client service direction to our team of 600+ CMT colleagues. Quigley’s focus includes a broad range of sectors and emerging ecosystems including communications, broadcasting, publishing, digital media, social media, information services, hosting, software, IT services, financial technologies, mobile payments, sharing economy, autonomous mobility, personal electronics, hardware, and electronic components. FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
19
popular and as technology becomes
edged sword is IoT. Communications
commonplace in cars, it’s likely that
giant Ericsson forecasts that there will
liability will lie with the manufacturer.”
be around 29bn connected devices by
As a result, survey respondents reported
2022, of which 18mn will be IoT-driven.
that they are increasingly being asked
From industrial IoT to connected cars
to take on more liability if an accident
and wearable technology, the
happens and can be traced back to their
possibilities for this innovation are
product or component.
endless – but so are the risks. Industrial
In last year’s edition of the CMT Risk
IoT is creating impressive efficiencies
Study, two-thirds of respondents said
in manufacturing operations but with
they believed that emerging tech-
unlimited connections, comes unlimited
nologies will increase risk complexity
ways to fail. “The biggest challenge, in
in the next three to five years. One
my opinion, is that IoT is unbounded:
disruptive technology set to be a double-
it’s limitless in terms of the number of w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
MARSH
20
“If you look across all industries, most respondents only talk about cyber-attacks and data privacy. On the other hand, because CMT companies are technology providers, they have liability if their technology fails to perform” — Thomas Quigley, US Communications, Media & Technology Practice Leader FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
21
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MARSH
things that can be connected,” Quigley explains. “With lots of devices comes greater vulnerabilities because many of the firms exploring IoT aren’t truly focusing on the security.” This is where risk enters the frame: as more devices are connected, it creates more and more opportunity for one of the devices to fail, causing the system to go down. “For IoT to work you also need a stable and secure connection under the 5G environment,” adds Chao. “CMT companies need to invest a lot in R&D in order to keep up.” Some of the risks involved with IoT we may not even
22
be aware of yet. “I think we have to be
FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
ready for surprises,” says Quigley
should be treated with risk insurance
candidly. “We haven’t experienced all
and risk transfer afterwards or
the different loss events that could
whether they should be treated with
happen yet.”
risk assessment and risk prevention
With these risks and uncertainties
at the beginning, a large majority of
taken into account, it isn’t all doom and
our clients agree that for over 75%
gloom. In a consumer-centric market,
of the risks the focus should be on
IoT has the opportunity to generate
upfront assessment and prevention,”
a unique customer experience and, with
highlights Quigley.
the right risk management strategy,
Chao echoes this, highlighting how
firms can sidestep the common pitfalls.
any problem which occurs could
Marsh, and indeed its survey
tarnish a firm’s brand integrity. “Once
respondents, believe that the secret to
a harmful cyber event happens, it can
tackling cybersecurity could lie in
destroy the company’s entire operation
both acting pre-emptively as well as
if they don’t have a contingency plan
reactively. “When asked whether risks
in place,” he says. “Risk assessment
CLICK TO WATCH : MARSH PIONEERS EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES FOR THE INSURANCE INDUSTRY w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
23
MARSH
24
FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
“Risk assessment and prevention analysis need to happen as frequently as possible. You need to recognise where the next risks are going to be. You don’t want to slow R&D down; you want to enable innovation by making sure you can do as much as you can to address risks before they happen” — Alexander Chao, Asia Communications, Media & Technology Practice Leader
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25
MARSH
26
“It’s about making sure that your IT is resilient and that broad industry events like the WannaCry attack don’t disrupt your operations. It’s also about protecting your intellectual property and protecting customer data” — Thomas Quigley, US Communications, Media & Technology Practice Leader FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
and prevention analysis need to happen as frequently as possible. You need to recognise where the next risks are going to be. You don’t want to slow R&D down; you want to enable innovation by making sure you can do as much as you can to address risks before they happen.” To tackle this, the pair believe that CMT companies should take a lesson from traditional firms and understand how the end customer is impacted when technology fails. Traditional, non-technology orientated firms could take a leaf out of their book too, recognising that, when it comes to cybersecurity, they shouldn’t just focus on data privacy but also need to talk about IT resiliency and other aspects of digital transformation. “Cybersecurity is such a broad term,” admits Quigley. “It’s about making sure that your IT is resilient and that broad industry events like the WannaCry attack don’t disrupt your operations. It’s also about protecting your intellectual property and protecting customer data.” Cybersecurity investment is a “never-ending story”, adds Chao, as hackers will always migrate and evolve. Risk management may seem a daunting task but Marsh believes it doesn’t have to be. To tackle this challenge, Quigley says that the industry w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
27
MARSH
needs to “take risk data from multiple sources and use that to inform and quantify new risks”. On top of this, companies should go back to basics. “We find that just by getting people in a room with a clean whiteboard you can talk about new products and potential loss scenarios – it’s critical to the process,” he says. Marsh can help firms navigate this tricky terrain. As the world’s largest insurance broker and one of the largest brokers specifically 28
for CMT companies, it has a wealth of experience and insights that it can share with its clients. “We work
$6bn
Approximate revenue
1871
Year founded
30,000 Approximate number of employees
with thousands of other companies and industries across the globe,” highlights Quigley. “With all client confidentiality maintained, we can
As well as having the analytical
take learnings and insights from those
strength to aid risk management,
companies and apply those to CMT
Chao believes that Marsh’s talented
companies. We can help them think
team also gives the global broker an
about what the loss impact could be
edge. “For risk consulting, we have
if their technology fails to perform.
qualified risk engineers,” he says. “The
Thanks to this experience, we have
majority of our engineers come from
innumerable data points which we
the industry and so they have the know-
can use not only to brainstorm but to
how to craft the business contingency
model, quantify and develop solutions
plan for the client.” With annual revenues
for a whole set of emerging risks.”
of over US$6bn and more than 30,000
FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
29
colleagues worldwide, it seems many
understanding technology is critical,
have put their faith in Marsh to help
understanding digital solutions is
them navigate the realm of risk
critical and understanding risk
management. Combining leading
assessment and quantification is
expertise, experience and innovative
critical. We’ve aggressively built up
solutions, Quigley and Chao believe
this capability over the past few
that, for any firm, putting trust in Marsh
years to meet our clients’ demands.”
is a safe bet. “As a broker, our history is defined by helping clients secure the insurance solutions they need,” reflects Quigley. “But we also recognise that w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
LEADERSHIP
30
DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION FOR AN OPEN BANKING FUTURE Smita Gupta, Senior Director, Regional Marketing, APAC at Finastra, discusses the future of open banking in Asia and across the globe WRITTEN BY
FEBRUARY 2019
OLIVIA MINNOCK
31
w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
LEADERSHIP
32
S
mita Gupta has long been fas-
how it impacts business decisions,
cinated with how digital trans-
with software”.
formation enables people’s
“What excited me was the opportu-
lives for the better. This is especially
nity to get into an industry that is really
clear today in the finance sector with
accelerating and looking at how we
advancements like artificial intelli-
can transform the entire value chain
gence (AI) and the cloud, and the
of banking,” she adds. This is encap-
much-anticipated shift to open bank-
sulated in her role as Senior Director,
ing. Gupta has been in technology
Regional Marketing, APAC, for financial
for 18 years, with a particular focus
services software provider Finastra.
on fintech, which she finds to be “a
Gupta is responsible for growing the
very interesting way to combine my
business in the APAC region.
economics background, where you analyse the behaviour of people and FEBRUARY 2019
Since its formation through the combination of Misys and D+H in
10,000
Approximate number of employees
130
Number of countries that Finastra works in
9,000
Approximate number of clients globally
2017, Finastra has grown to a company reporting US$1.9bn annual revenue,
towards our platform vision,” says Gupta. Now, the business is positioned to not
and employs over 10,000 people to
only play a key role in the digital transfor-
serve 9,000 customers. Currently,
mation of the finance sector, but also
90 of the world’s top 100 banks use
the open banking landscape and the
Finastra’s software solutions which
move towards collaboration as a means
span retail, corporate banking, trade
of sparking innovation. “Finastra truly
finance and more. Each day, around
believes the future of finance is open, and
10% of trade finance runs on Finastra
we can bring various people together in
software and it enables 175m+ retail
the ecosystem to collaborate together
accounts. “With the Fourth Industrial
using our platform, FusionFabric.cloud,”
Revolution, we have evolved from
Gupta explains. FusionFabric.cloud
a software company to a solutions
is Finastra’s Platform-as-a-Service
company, and now we are moving
solution which enables financial w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
33
LEADERSHIP
“ We have a bold ambition to be through an ecosystem of partners. “With the platform approach, we are the number one looking to connect fintechs, developopen platform for ers and more to our 9,000+ customers innovation in the with our platform. No one is doing that world of financial in the market across the broad sectors we cover. We have a bold ambition to services” services companies to be more
innovative by fostering collaboration
be the number one open platform for
innovation in the world of financial services,” she adds. The kind of collaboration Finastra enables will be vital in an open banking 34
environment. “We clearly see in the future an ecosystem where we are enabling financial institutions to serve their customers in a more open and collaborative way using open APIs,” comments Gupta. “We are also seeing that the adoption of third-party software is growing rapidly. This is where Finastra steps in to help banks unlock their potential and navigate through the challenges of regulation, digitalisation, and the open banking frameworks that have been put in place across various markets globally.” The landscape of open banking, which will involve collaboration and data sharing between fintechs, banks, FEBRUARY 2019
— Smita Gupta, Senior Director, Regional Marketing, APAC, Finastra
CLICK TO WATCH : OPEN FOR INNOVATION, COLLABORATION AND BANKING WITH UNLIMITED POTENTIAL 35
software and third-party providers,
banks are in the ‘advanced’ stages
is vast and somewhat concerning for
of a data-based transformation. The
businesses and consumers alike, and
remaining majority will need to step
in order to gauge this new territory,
up to compete against the fintechs in
Finastra launched the Open Banking
this new ecosystem, but many exhibit
Readiness Index in APAC. The survey
concerns about customer data privacy
measured banks against their adoption
(71%) and compliance (53%).
of APIs, third-party ecosystems, state
These concerns are not unfounded,
of data-based transformation, data
as the data sharing involved in open
monetisation and state of innovation.
banking is unfamiliar territory for the
While 70% of banks agree open banking
finance sector and as such poses
will increase their customer reach, only
cultural and technological challenges.
23% have invested in an API manage-
“Traditionally, banks have not been very
ment platform, and just 25% of APAC
open to sharing this data,” says Gupta. w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
LEADERSHIP
“ Businesses in data, but for customers who must be Asia,notably able to trust this is done safely. “It is in the financial extremely important for banks to service area,are establish a very standardised framework on how data is accessed, and now leading the what level of data is accessed and world in terms of consumed in the way fintechs consume it.” Gupta adds that it’s imporinvention and tant to work with the right third-party even adoption providers so that any data shared remains secure and compliant, for the of new business benefit of business and consumer. models” For example, Finastra’s FusionFabric. Concerns over security are not just a key factor for the banks sharing
36
cloud is underpinned by Microsoft Azure, as is a selection of its global payments and retail banking products. “Microsoft has strong compliance in the industry – they spend millions of dollars making sure the infrastructure is stable and secure,” Gupta outlines. “There are multiple regulatory, as well as privacy and security rules that providers such as Microsoft adhere to. Yes, data security standards are a concern, but this can be addressed when you work with reliable, trustworthy third-party providers.” Gupta is confident that concerns involved in open banking are slowly FEBRUARY 2019
— Smita Gupta, Senior Director, Regional Marketing, APAC, Finastra
being tempered with banks beginning to see fintechs “as a friend, not an enemy”. The Open Banking Readiness Index found that 84% of banks in APAC consider collaboration with external partners extremely critical for succession adopting open banking strategies. “90% of innovation is coming in from the outside,” says Gupta. “Hence, it is becoming critical for innovation to be seen as a joint initiative when it comes to the financial service industry. Banks and fintechs are collaborating in a variety of ways through accelerators and incubators.” For the future of banking, Gupta outlines four key trends: a focus on the consumer lifecycle; use of AI and machine learning to increase personalisation; digital transformation and continuous innovation; and open banking platforms and data. “According to Accenture, businesses that are successfully applying AI could increase profitability by an average of 38% by 2035,” says Gupta. “This means that from a business or end-customer perspective, the more banks look at applying AI and machine learning for deeper analytics, it creates an exponentially faster and more personalised w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
37
LEADERSHIP
“ Banks and fintechs are collaborating in a variety of ways through accelerators and incubators” — Smita Gupta, Senior Director, Regional Marketing, APAC, Finastra
38
customer experience, by getting them
perspective, as AI gathers more pace
better insights.”
in terms of augmenting the human
To this end, more and more banks are
workforce in the industry, you will see
deploying chatbots for elements like
customers receive 24/7 assistance;
retail banking and investment advisory
there’s going to be instant gratification
and Finastra aims to be at the forefront
and convenience in a faster, more
of this AI revolution. “We are deeply
intuitive way.” Keeping the customer
engaged in advancing the use of AI in
experience at the forefront, Finastra
financial services,” Gupta emphasises.
regularly organises customer advisory
“Our Detect solution uses AI to catch
boards and Chief Product and
‘fat finger’ trades before they are pro-
Technology Officer Eli Rosner often
cessed in the capital markets space.
meets with clients to gain an under-
From the retail banking and payments
standing of their experience, as well as
FEBRUARY 2019
39
attending forums such as Money20/20.
happening here, and to ride the wave
“When we say 90% of innovation will
of open banking in the region,” says
come from the outside, we truly believe
Gupta. “In many respects, businesses
that and this is why we are out there
in Asia, notably in the financial service
talking to customers and the industry
area, are now leading the world in
and building ecosystems.”
terms of invention or even adoption of
As far as the adoption of new technologies in banking, APAC is cer-
new business models in order to meet the changing needs of the customer.”
tainly the place to be and Finastra will not stop growing in that region any time soon. “We will continue to invest in APAC, to support the digital transformation of financial institutions that’s w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
BLOCKCHAIN
40
FEBRUARY 2019
: s t e Nugg
g n i g r e m d n a y t i secur e c n e i n conve h g u o r h t n i a h c block
r e d n u o f n i Blockcha s n i a l p x e n o ns h o J r i a t s a Al of e r u t u f e h w hy t s t n e m y a p s s e l h s a c e r u c se ive t p u r s i d e h lies with t technology… W R IT TE N B Y
CK O L IV IA M IN N O
w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
41
BLOCKCHAIN
H
aving bank details lost or stolen is something many of us have experienced, but as technol-
ogy continues to disrupt the finance industry
the lengthy process of resolving the problem
seems increasingly archaic. This was certainly the case for Alastair Johnson, founder and CEO of blockchain startup Nuggets, upon losing his own card details. When he eventually received his replacement card, he had to re-enter new informa-
tion on dozens of websites and was struck by the 42
lack of both convenience and security at a time when data breaches were making the headlines. “You wouldn’t write down your mother’s maiden name, email address and national insurance (NI) number on a post-it note and leave it in every cash till on the high street – but in a digital sense we do that all over the place,” he comments. The experience prompted Johnson to found Nuggets, which promises to help customers “take back control” of their data in 2016. The ecommerce payment and ID platform allows users to store their payment details on blockchain technology to achieve a single sign-on method which means personal data doesn’t need to be shared with multiple organisations. “You can transact securely and verify your identity without somebody having access to that data and being able to take over FEBRUARY 2019
43
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BLOCKCHAIN
“ You can’t compete against WeChat Pay and AliPay but you can add value to them” — Alastair Johnson, Founder and CEO, Nuggets
44
FEBRUARY 2019
CLICK TO WATCH : ‘NUGGETS – TAKE BACK CONTROL OF YOUR DATA’ 45
your information. If a business doesn’t
Johnson cites two reasons for the
log the personal data in their central-
failings we see in the headlines. “There
ised silos in the first place, it can’t be
are people who don’t understand tech
breached,” Johnson explains.
and are being victimised for that and
With breaches at large tech compa-
there’s the other side where people do
nies cited as a ‘tipping point’, a recent
understand it and they’re trying to do
study by Gartner has found for the
best practices but those options where
first time that privacy is becoming
you have to log in with a username and
more of a priority over convenience for
password still exist.”
consumers – in 2009, it was reported
A key challenge for any tech company
that consumers remained unwilling to
then, no matter which platform is being
sacrifice convenience to keep their
provided, is to ensure convenience while
data secure. As organisations battle to
also assuring customers that keeping
develop their cybersecurity offerings,
their data secure is top priority – but for w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
BLOCKCHAIN
Johnson’s single sign-on vision this presents more of an opportunity. “It actually gets more convenient with all the security, because you’re not passing around usernames and passwords: you’re verifying ID across a network. So, it’s a lot more secure and convenient – you get the best of both worlds.”
STAYING SECURE IN A CASHLESS SOCIETY In an increasingly cashless landscape, Johnson explains how a single sign-on 46
system using blockchain will enable various societies to complete the
“ If a business doesn’t log the personal data in their centralised silos in the first place, it can’t be breached” — Alastair Johnson, Founder and CEO, Nuggets
transition away from cash and even card. “Now we have the technology to leapfrog plastic with a funded digital
ID to that payment app, so it allows
identity which can then be associated
access to my payment but I don’t need
with a digital watch or fitness band. It’s
a plastic card that the numbers can be
crazy that we’re still relying on this bit
copied off?’”
of plastic with a chip to come through
Tying in with the development of
in the post a week after it’s been
open banking which will involve closer
cloned,” Johnson argues, adding that
collaboration and data sharing,
cashless has yet to go far enough.
Johnson feels that the future of ID
“Even though you have Apple Pay and
technology should be agnostic. “In the
Android Pay, we’re still adding a plastic
past, you’ve seen a lot of wallet apps
card of information to make that work
from different schemes, but wouldn’t
as a secure payment source. At Nuggets,
it make sense that they all tied back
were saying ‘why don’t I add my digital
to the same APIs and services? When
FEBRUARY 2019
47
mobile phones first came out, you
Pay, serving over one million merchants
could only ring other people on the
across Asia. This partnership will mean
same network – this only lasted about
Alipay and WeChat Pay users can use
six months. In the early days, everyone
a digital ID to make payments as
comes out with their version but at the
opposed to attaching these to a bank
end of the day, the agnostic approach
card. “You can’t compete against
is going to be a winner.”
WeChat Pay and AliPay but you can
In China, fast becoming the home of
add value to them,” says Johnson.
cashless payments, Nuggets has
“Currently you’re going back to plastic
entered into a partnership with mobile
to enable them – you’re basically
payment technology, service and
rerouting to the old system. The potential
solution provider QFPay, which is used
is that you have your login and maybe
by epayment giants Alipay and WeChat
your profile data within your own realm w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
BLOCKCHAIN
but it can be used for those products and services.” In Asia and further afield, Johnson is keen to highlight the potential of ID technology for business, particularly for SMEs. “It enables small businesses, people at food festivals or taxi drivers to transact without that chunky terminal. The potential for the smaller is immediately accessible… and this can also benefit larger businesses as well.”
A BLOCKCHAIN BASED FUTURE 48
“ It’s a lot more secure and convenient — you get the best of both worlds” — Alastair Johnson, Founder and CEO, Nuggets
For Johnson, blockchain technology was a clear choice in implementing a more secure and convenient platform. “We spent time looking at other solutions to get to the same point – the key one being zero knowledge storage. Existing systems that do zero knowledge storage are quite clunky, and often they’ve got root level access to providers and such like. With blockchain, only the user has the key to their information,” he explains. “We have zero knowledge, we have the decentralised network, and we have encryption to an extremely high level – so blockchain ticked many boxes.” In addition, blockchain allows a kind of credit history to be set up due FEBRUARY 2019
Alastair Johnson talking about personal data storage @Retail Risk 2018
to the log it takes of every activity. “If you go and do 100 different payments to different places it demonstrates proof that you are a good actor on the network to the next person – you don’t have to be risk assessed.” For any blockchain founder – and Johnson isn’t just ‘any’ founder, having been shortlisted for ‘Blockchain Founder of the Year’ at the 2018 BMW i UK Tech Founder Awards – it is often necessary to play the part of evangelist for this
Seema Khinda Johnson, Co-Founder and COO, Nuggets
fairly new technology which is often mistrusted or misunderstood, but even in the past six months Johnson says the potential is finally being recognised. “It’s not just an intriguing tech conversation now – we’re starting to see real use cases coming out for blockchain and being applied. 2018 has brought the understanding of how consumers can react closely with the blockchain. In years to come, people won’t know or care if they’re on the blockchain; it’ll be fixed into life,” he anticipates.
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D I G I TA L T R A N S F O R M AT I O N
50
SUPPORTING THE DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION OF FINANCE Ashok Suppiah discusses the rapid digital transformation currently impacting banks across the globe, and how his tech startup supports and manages this change WRITTEN BY
FEBRUARY 2019
OLIVIA MINNOCK
51
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D I G I TA L T R A N S F O R M AT I O N
I
“
f there are complex problems, we like to solve them with simple solutions.” This has long been a passion for Ashok Suppiah,
CEO and co-founder of tech startup Mitra Innovation, which aims to assist businesses of all shapes and sizes with their digital transformation journeys – with finance being a key area of disruption today. Suppiah previously worked for the now NASDAQ-listed Medusa Corporation, which he joined alongside the CEO when it was
a ‘basement operation’. At the time, 52
Suppiah and Medusa helped clients progress from Unix to Microsoft Windows, bringing in 100 customers over five years, and even raising $40mn in venture capital after the dot-com bubble burst. Following this, Suppiah worked for several more startups with varying levels of success, which allowed him to pursue his passion for innovation – and Mitra which he joined two years ago has been no exception. “At startups, I was able to bring in simplicity which a lot of large corporates aren’t able to action due to various issues,” he explains. “I’m more about innovation – how can we simplify complex problems for all the customers, users and employees? If you have to click 10 times to do FEBRUARY 2019
53
a task, and that can be made into two clicks – that’s what drives us.” Mitra is all about solving complex problems with simple solutions, and this has led to a business that is growing at a rate of 200% year on year. “It’s a great place to be,” says Suppiah. “We’re reinvesting and really growing a lot of our partnerships. We are a customerfirst organisation. We like to work with customers, think for them and help them with their digital journey.” For example, MONETA Money Bank is a Czech Republic-based financial w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
D I G I TA L T R A N S F O R M AT I O N
institution undergoing a vast digital transformation project. “They went into the market, they selected the WSO2 platform to build their integration capability, and they chose us because we are not only a premier certified partner of WSO2, but we also have the digital capability to deliver a highly scalable platform. We have the ability to accelerate. One of their key criteria was to help them get to market faster,” Suppiah explains, adding that while this would have taken MONETA a year or more, it happened within five months
54
thanks to Mitra’s support and experience. The WSO2 platform replaced MONETA’s entire legacy platform and as such has enabled MONETA to operate more simply and efficiently, thereby improving the experience for the end users and customers – highlighting the reason Suppiah founded Mitra in the first place. “Millennials and the new, younger generation are going to prefer digital banking as opposed to branch banking,” Suppiah observes. “That means a decline in the number of branches, but an increase in their use or adoption, if banks can become digitally savvy. FEBRUARY 2019
“If there are complex problems, we like to solve them with simple solutions” — Ashok Suppiah, CEO, Mitra Innovation
55
We see that across various organisa-
We can already see Barclays, Lloyds,
tions in the UK and Europe. We’re also
Santander and Royal Bank of
in Kenya, Southeast Asia and Australia
Scotland (RBS) are well ahead in this
which has adopted open banking.”
field. If you are a user of one of those
If banks fail to digitally transform the
banks, you can look up your bank
customer experience they offer
balance from other banks through the
efficiently, Suppiah warns that modern
app itself – so the open API system is
fintech organisations are primed to take
really coming together.”
over the market. “In the finance sector,
A major challenge in the digital
the primary driver is open banking and
transformation of finance involves
use of open APIs. With that, there’s a
integrating many facets of business,
possibility to involve third parties. The
such as loan origination, card
second driver is: what can banks offer
services and insurance, before the
beyond the norms of basic offerings?
entire business can be transformed. w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
D I G I TA L T R A N S F O R M AT I O N
56
Customers may use a plethora of
technologies within many banks provide
different online systems and apps for
a further challenge to this integrated,
the same bank. “You need to integrate
digital future. “How do you still maintain
the business before you can integrate
it, but enable other digital capabilities
the capabilities to the customers, and
on top of it?” Suppiah asks, adding
before you can make it secure,” says
that this is where Mitra’s integration
Suppiah. “That’s the biggest challenge.”
platform comes in.
Indeed, customers are expecting
In addition, compliance and security
a smoother experience and will soon
will always be key issues in the world
reject having to go through a number
of finance, and open banking involving
of different channels. Legacy
data sharing and collaboration brings
FEBRUARY 2019
57
this even further into the limelight.
increases the need to be highly secure.
Leading UK banks like Santander are
Through open banking, you are exposing
implementing open banking and indeed
data to third parties. You are transmit-
MONETA launched its open banking
ting information about the customer to
environment last year. “There are a lot
third parties. That opens up another
of banks in Poland, Romania and
level of security. Making that secure and
Bulgaria that still need to catch up,”
compliant is the biggest headache I’m
Suppiah adds. “So that’s a big problem
hearing from CIOs.”
for them because once they open their
The third issue Suppiah points to is
services and data to third parties, how
customer experience. “If they don’t get
do they make it secure? Open banking
the customer experience right, they w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
D I G I TA L T R A N S F O R M AT I O N
could lose customers,” he says simply. “I think there’s a fear, at least in tier two and three banks, of seeing their customers move to fintechs in the next decade.” In order to meet customer expectations, it comes back to developing an increasingly smooth digital experience as mentioned above. “Traditionally, mobile banking apps only did two things: you could check your balance and pay somebody. Now, you can see your mortgage balance, your card, you can set up direct debits… 58
customers are demanding those kinds of functionalities, both on the consumer side and the corporate side.” This can be just as important for business clients as it can for customers on the retail side. “Sometimes we have to make an urgent payment and can’t be waiting at a branch or even opening up a laptop,” says Suppiah. “This is common for SMEs all over the world – and SMEs are the largest market globally. Demand is increasing for better convenience, secure, reliable service, and the ability to do crossborder business more easily.” Serving SMEs, as well as the local branches of large corporations, FEBRUARY 2019
“ Demand is increasing for better convenience, secure, reliable service, and the ability to do cross-border business more easily” — Ashok Suppiah, CEO, Mitra Innovation
requires Mitra to intelligently localise its service while also maintaining its global brand and quality. “We have to adapt to a number of differences, the number one being cultural,” Suppiah explains. “In the UK and Europe for example, there are strict vendor evaluation processes with multiple layers, while in eastern Africa of the Middle East, CIOs are more accessible – they make direct decisions; it’s more of a trust-based model.” Suppiah also cites language as a barrier, with Mitra often utilising local consultants, as well as legality, consumer models and currency fluctuation. “There are a lot of challenges, but therein lie opportunities for us,” he adds. Each relationship Mitra enters into around the world, such as the one with Moneta, is built to last. “For us, every engagement is an interesting engagement,” says Suppiah. “We learn from it.” As well as learning and collaborating, Suppiah is keen to highlight the ongoing support Mitra provides its clients as the software landscape changes. “We used to buy the application, install it, run it, and if there was a problem, we’d call for support. Traditionally, application w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
59
D I G I TA L T R A N S F O R M AT I O N
60
“ If you have to click 10 times to do a task and that can be made into two clicks — that’s what drives us” — Ashok Suppiah, CEO, Mitra Innovation
FEBRUARY 2019
developers focused on building the application and doing the ‘go live’. Now, if you look at cloud-enabled applications like Google Mail or Office365; you use it every day and there’s support to build it. The philosophy behind Mitra is we want to be an end-to-end service provider; we want to help the customer with their strategy, their design, their architecture, and the actual implementation of the product. We help them to go live and then we provide ongoing managed services support.” Going forward, Mitra will not only be a loyal partner and supportive technology vendor for its clients, but the organisation will also take advantage of an increasing demand for digital transformation in the finance and telecommunications space, says Suppiah, especially among large corporations and mid-tier banks in eastern Africa, as well as Europe, the Middle East and Southeast Asia. “We’re planning to invest in those markets next year,” he adds.
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ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
62
DIGITAL DISRUPTION OF FINTECH THROUGH
AI
Kate Rosenshine, Cloud Solution Architect Manager of Data and AI at Microsoft, discusses the impact AI promises for the financial services industry and how firms can build trust in the technology K ATE ROSENSHINE MARCUS LAWRENCE
WRITTEN BY EDITED BY
FEBRUARY 2019
63
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ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
A
mongst the wealth of emergent disruptive technologies set to revolutionise financial services,
artificial intelligence (AI) offers perhaps
the most diverse range of opportunities to the sector. Kate Rosenshine, Cloud Solution Architect Manager of Data and AI at Microsoft, spoke with FinTech Magazine about the impact AI will have on the financial industry and how best to establish trust in the technology among consumers. 64
How do you see AI transforming the financial industry in the next two years? Artificial intelligence is becoming an ever more important part of our lives. AI is already integrated into many aspects of our everyday applications, as many of us are already familiar with AI-infused search engines, digital personal assistants and recommendation systems. Whether it is powering a new generation of self-driving cars, guarding us against fraud or helping doctors better diagnose health conditions, AI’s transformational abilities will continue to be felt throughout our society in increasingly ubiquitous and innovative ways. FEBRUARY 2019
“ AI and its transformational abilities are unprecedented and so organisations of all sizes must adapt to being more open” — Kate Rosenshine, Cloud Solution Architect Manager of Data and AI, Microsoft
Within Financial Services, 61% of the industry is already either currently using AI or plan to adopt AI applications within the next 12 months. Over the next few years we will see more of these organisations embarking on their AI journeys, creating subsequent change in the industry that will be felt like never before. The sector is already leading the charge in the use of AI technologies such as machine learning in fraud detection, virtual assistants for enhanced customer interactions and Big Data analytics for improved decision making and risk management. These technologies are empowering the industry and improving both customer and employee experiences alike through product innovation, with evidently much more to come. AI and cloud-enabled systems, which break the barrier to easily access huge amounts of computational power, already empower financial institutions to leverage a continuously growing amount of data from a wide variety of sources. AI algorithms, which have vastly improved in their accuracy and speed, can be applied to this data for a wide range of applications, from forecasting future events and behaviours more effectively to enabling actionable insights. These AI-powered tools can help firms to conduct ‘what-if’ analyses (which are critical in terms of forecasting the w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
65
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
effects of potential changes in business strategies) with increased accuracy, better manage risk and adherence to compliance and regulatory requirements in an increasingly complex landscape, and empower customers to make smarter, data-driven decisions. Leveraging the benefits and power of AI is a necessary choice for organisations in the financial industry, as our research finds that organisations already on the AI journey are outperforming others by up to 5% on factors 66
like productivity, performance and business outcomes. This is a huge positive impact for any organisation’s
“ Within financial services, 61% of the industry is already either currently using AI or plan to adopt AI applications within the next 12 months” — Kate Rosenshine, Cloud Solution Architect Manager of Data and AI, Microsoft
bottom line, especially in the financial industry in what is quickly becoming one of the world’s most complex and competitive landscapes. Over the next two years customers,
to bring truly innovative experiences to their customers and employees.
will continue to have more choices and
and evolve, especially as AI will become
How do you believe that smaller financial companies should build trust of AI with their customers – is this harder to do than for a major bank with a loyal existing customer base?
more embedded in our core systems.
As more and more critical AI systems
It will be only those that continuously
come into our lives, organisations of all
and fully embrace AI that will be able
shapes and sizes will have an increas-
will become increasingly attuned to their power over their financial decisions. It will be crucial for organisations to start harnessing the power of AI to innovate
FEBRUARY 2019
67
ing amount of responsibility towards
First, it is important for financial
our society. Some of these organisations
organisations to establish a clear set
have already started to face pressures
of ethical guidelines and frameworks
with regards to data privacy and security,
around the use of AI to instil confidence
leading to an increasing lack of consum-
and build trust. A recent House of Lords
er trust and reputational crises. There-
report titled ‘AI in the UK: ready, willing
fore, when organisations, large or small
and able?’ highlights the need for “ethics
seek to embrace AI they must take an
to take centre stage in AI’s development
ethical first approach and recognise
and use”, and our research shows that
their great responsibility. So how do
those who begin their AI journey by
they do this?
creating core ethical values are 28% w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
“ Our research finds that organisations already on the AI journey are outperforming others by up to 5% on factors like productivity, performance and business outcomes” — Kate Rosenshine, Cloud Solution Architect Manager of Data and AI, Microsoft
68
more likely to seek to improve the world
consequences and malicious misuse
and make life better in the UK.
of these technologies.
Building public trust in AI will be an
More than ever, companies need to
important factor in allowing both organ-
make a conscious effort to help people
isations and consumers to benefit . With
understand AI through public education.
this, financial organisations must create
AI will need to be accessible to every-
new systems and control measures to
one, and the public will also need to be
ensure they are transparent as to where
educated to ensure that we are focusing
and how they are using AI to make
on solving the right problems and not
decisions, as well as prevent unintended
inadvertently creating biases in our
FEBRUARY 2019
69
systems. While major banks may have
approach to AI is essential to building
larger existing customer bases, AI and
trust. According to our research, those
its transformational abilities are unprec-
organisations that start their AI journey
edented and so organisations of all sizes
with an ethical and transparent first
must adapt to being more open. Only
approach can outperform those that
then will they gain people’s trust and
don’t by up to 9% - an opportunity that
only then will the use of AI really flourish
no organisation can afford to miss.
and transform the financial industry. From the impact of workers to data protection and security, taking an ethical w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
T O P 10
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FEBRUARY 2019
TOP 10 71
In September, analyst firm Envision Intelligence predicted growth in the global fintech market to be as high as 74% by 2025. FinTech Magazine takes a look at the top 10 fintech startups set to disrupt the industry this year, according to CB Insights WRITTEN BY
HARRY MENEAR
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10 Plaid Technologies Based in San Francisco, Plaid Technologies was founded in 2013 with the goal of “democratising financial services through technology.” The company’s offerings are centred around a toolkit that protects interactions and data exchanges between customers, banks and third-party applications. Currently the startup has thousands of customers that use its API suite to create applications. Officially valued at US$2.65bn, Plaid achieved unicorn status in December, making it the youngest unicorn in the top 10.
https://plaid.com/company
FEBRUARY 2019
73
09 Circle “Crypto powered. People centric.” Bringing the power of the digital ledger to the customer base at large is at the centre of Bostonbased fintech startup Circle’s mission. Founded in 2013 by Jeremy Allaire and Sean Neville, Circle offers four products: Circle Invest, which simplifies investing in cryptocurrencies for the average user; Circle Pay, a peer-to-peer payment platform; Circle Trade, a cryptocurrency trading platform that processes $2bn worth of crypto payments per month; and Poloneix, one of the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges. Circle obtained unicorn status in May 2018, and is currently valued at $3bn.
www.circle.com/en-gb w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
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08 Credit Karma Also based in San Francisco, Credit Karma offers its customers free credit scores, credit monitoring services and insights, as well as free tax return assistance. The company was founded in 2007 by Kenneth Lin, Ryan Graciano and Nichole Mustard, with the goal of bringing “transparency and simplicity to the credit industry.� It attained unicorn status in September 2009, making it the oldest unicorn on the top 10 list, and is currently valued at $3.5bn. Credit Karma is primarily funded by Felicis Ventures, SV Angel and Founders Fund.
www.creditkarma.com FEBRUARY 2019
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07 Nubank The only South American fintech startup in the top 10, Nubank is headquartered in San Paolo, Brazil and functions as a tech-driven alternative to traditional financial service providers. Founded in 2013, Nubank’s primary product offering is a zero-interest credit card, as well as a digital bank account and, as of December, a debit function on its card. The company is currently aiming to reach 120mn customers in 2019, particularly in demographics without access to banking services and credit cards. Nubank achieved unicorn status in March 2018 and is currently valued at $4bn.
www.nubank.com.br w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
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06 SoFi Founded in 2011, SoFi (Social Finance) is headquartered in San Francisco and provides student loan refinancing, mortgages and personal loans. Due to its online-only structure, SoFi can offer loans at lower cost. In January 2018, Twitter COO Anthony Noto became the CEO of SoFi. The company achieved unicorn status in February 2015 and is currently valued at $4.5bn.
www.sofi.com
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05 Robinhood Headquartered in Menlo Park, California, Robinhood Markets Inc was co-founded by Vladimir Tenev and Baiju Bhatt in 2013. The company’s app allows users to easily buy, sell and trade stocks in publicly traded companies and exchange-traded funds on US stock exchanges without paying commission. Zerocommission trading, twinned with the accessibility of its platform interface, has seen the company grow to serve over 2mn users. Robinhood attained unicorn status in April, 2017 and is currently valued at $5.6bn.
https://robinhood.com w w w.f i nte c hma ga z i n e. com
T O P 10
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04 Coinbase Reportedly exceeding $1bn in revenue in 2017, Coinbase has been hailed as the “most user-friendly onramp to the cryptocurrency world� by Forbes. The company operates a digital wallet service that allows user to trade Bitcoin, Ethereum and Litecoin with over 10mn other users worldwide. Coinbase was founded in 2012 by Fred Ehrsam and current CEO Brian Armstrong. The company is based in San Francisco, achieved unicorn status in August, 2017 and is currently valued at $8bn.
www.coinbase.com
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03 One97 India’s only entry to the fintech startup top 10, One97 Communications is headquartered in Noida and operates e-commerce payment system and digital wallet, Paytm. The Paytm brand also operates its own e-commerce retail platform, Paytm Mall, which sells electronics, groceries, fashion goods and motor vehicles, in the vein of Amazon’s online store. One97 achieved unicorn status in May 2015 and is valued at $10bn.
https://paytm.com
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T O P 10
02 Stripe Headquartered in San Francisco, Stripe has established itself as a leader in providing digital infrastructure for online payments. The company’s platform processes billions of dollars across hundreds of thousands of businesses, according to Forbes. “Whether 80
you’re creating a subscription service, an on-demand marketplace, an e-commerce store, or a crowdfunding platform, Stripe’s meticulously designed APIs and unmatched functionality help you create the best possible product for your users.” Founded by Irish brothers Patrick and John Collison in 2010, Stripe’s valuation doubled in late 2018, up to $20bn from its valuation of $9.2bn in September of the same year.
https://stripe.com
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T O P 10
01 Lufax Based in Shanghai, Lufax (also known as Lu.com) operates an online peer-to-peer lending service, in addition to its online finance marketplace, which focuses on providing lending services to small-tomedium enterprises and individuals. Founded in 2011, Lufax is currently the 82
second-largest p2p lender in China. The company is primarily funded by Ping An Insurance and the Bank of China. Achieving unicorn status in 2014, it is the second oldest company and unicorn on the top 10. Lufax is currently valued at $38bn, slightly less than the company was aiming for in its December valuation, but more than double the estimated valuation when the company began its last round of funding in June 2018.
www.lu.com
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EVENTS & A S S O C I AT I O N S
The biggest industry events and conferences EDITED BY OLIVIA MINNOCK from around the world
11–13 MARCH 2019
MoneyLIVE Spring
84
19–20 MARCH 2019
[ MADRID, SPAIN ]
Deep Learning in Finance Summit
Held at the Meliá Avenida América
[ LONDON, UK ]
hotel in Madrid, this event consists of
Held at St Paul’s in London, the Deep
two conferences bringing together
Learning in Finance Summit is set to
over 150 companies and 350 attend-
host 30 speakers and 200 attendees for
ees from 40 countries around the
discussions around data mining, finan-
world. With one conference covering
cial forecasting, stock market prediction,
cards and payments and another cov-
blockchain and more. Pitched at data
ering retail banking, there is something
scientists, financial regulators, CTOs
for everyone in the financial technol-
and data engineers, the event promises
ogy space. Topics up for discussion
over 12 hours’ worth of networking
this year include open APIs, customer
opportunities. Confirmed speakers for
engagement, FinTech, IoT, tokenisa-
the event include Angel Serrano, Head
tion and security. Attendees can hear
of Data Science at Santander UK;
from various expert speakers over the
Neal Lathina, Senior Data Scientist at
course of the event, including Ignacio
Monzo; Jessica Lennard, Director of
Juliá Vilar, Global Head of Retail at
External Affairs, Data Science Lab at
ING, and Christian Schäfer, Global
Visa; and AJ Hashim, Head of Innova-
Head of Payments at Deutsche Bank.
tion & Emerging Tech at Barclays.
Click to visit website
www.re-work.co
FEBRUARY 2019
10–11 APRIL 2019
Dublin Tech Summit 03–04 APRIL 2019
[ DUBLIN, IRELAND ]
IP Expo Manchester
Dublin Tech Summit is one of the larg-
[ MANCHESTER, UK ]
est technology conferences in Europe,
Cybersecurity is a vital issue for fin-
promising a plethora of influential tech
tech leaders especially, and this event
leaders. 2019’s cohort include Werner
is the UK’s biggest IT and cybersecu-
Vogels, CTO of Amazon.com, Douglas
rity event outside of London. 2019 will
Terrier, CTO of NASA, and Mihai Alisie,
mark the fifth iteration of the event
co-founder of Ethereum. Attending
which is made up of professionals in
companies and partners at the Tech
cloud, infrastructure and cybersecu-
Summit include Airbnb, Amazon, Micro-
rity. This year, it hopes to include more
soft, Google, SAP and Facebook. The
topics surrounding data analytics, AI,
event takes place at the Convention
software development, IoT and Block-
Centre in Dublin’s Docklands area, just
chain. With sponsors including Cisco
20 minutes from the city’s international
and Sophos, speakers at the event
airport. This event explores technology
will range from Dr Nicola Millard,
transformation and the impact of digital
Head of Customer Insights & Futures
disruption across many industries and
at BT, to Chris Testa-O’Neill, Data
as such offers valuable perspective for
Scientist at Microsoft.
the fintech leader.
Click to visit website
dublintechsummit.com
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EVENTS & A S S O C I AT I O N S
21–22 MAY 2019
ICT Spring Europe
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03–05 JUNE 2019
[ LUXEMBOURG ]
Money 20/20 Europe
This year, ICT Spring Europe promises
[ AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS ]
to focus on three key topics: digitalisa-
Boasting over 6,000 attendees and
tion, space and of course fintech. As
2,000 companies from around 82 dif-
such, attendees can expect to hear
ferent countries, over the course of the
about AI, insurtech, venture capital, IoT,
three-day event more than 490 speak-
telecommunications and satellites, and
ers are set to deliver around 80 hours
even human migration to space. The
of insightful content. Money 20/20 dubs
two-day conference is made up of over
itself as “where the payments, fintech
5,000 key decision makers across vari-
and financial services industries come
ous business sectors. ICT Spring is held
together to connect and build the future
at the European Convention Centre,
of money.” Attendees are promised origi-
just minutes from Luxembourg airport,
nal content on both a regional and global
and the event programme is packed
scale, breaking news announcements,
with seminars, presentations, entertain-
product launches, networking opportuni-
ment and networking opportunities.
ties and access to exciting startups and
In 2018, notable speakers were Xavier
innovators. 2018’s Europe event featured
Bettel, Prime Minister of Luxembourg;
prominent speakers including Ralph
Susan Coleman, a Managing Director
Hamers, CEO of ING Group; Andy
at PwC; and John Thornhill, Innovation
Maguire, Group COO of HSBC; and
Editor at the Financial Times.
Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple.
www.ictspring.com
Click to visit website
FEBRUARY 2019
OCTOBER 2019
Finovate Asia 19–20 JUNE 2019
[ VENUE TBC ]
Blockchain Expo Europe
Following on from the success of 2018’s
[ AMSTERDAM, THE NETHERLANDS ]
event in Hong Kong as part of the city-
Blockchain Expo is a series of confer-
state’s Fintech Week, advance tickets
ences which take place in Europe and
are already on sale for 2019 which
North America. A total of four co-located
promises 600+ attendees, 20+ firms
events throughout the year welcome
offering demonstrations and 80+ expert
over 36,000 attendees, over 1000
speakers for a mix of speeches and
speakers and over 1000 exhibitors. The
panels. Finovate Asia advertises the
Europe Expo takes place at RAI Amster-
opportunity for attendees to “meet the
dam with 10,000 guests expected.
fintechs, platform players, financial
Notable speakers on the agenda come
institutions, regulators and investors
from Maersk, Gucci, Volkswagen, Shell
who are redefining the future of finan-
and IBM as the conference looks at the
cial services.” Notable speakers in 2018
many uses of this disruptive technology.
attended from Danske Bank, AXA Lab,
Topics to be discussed over the two-day
Accenture, Bank of America and Alipay.
event include cryptofinance, blockchain
Click to visit website
for enterprise, cybersecurity and supply chain management.
www.blockchain-expo.com
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AXA Singapore: a customer centric digital transformation WRIT TEN BY
CATHERINE S TURM AN PRODUCED BY
A LE X PAGE
ASIA
89
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AXA SINGAPORE
We spoke with AXA Singapore’s Chief Operating Officer, Eric Lelyon about developing customer centric products and services for its digitally savvy consumers
T
he Singaporean market is witnessing significant demand for life and health insurance products. Gaining double digit
growth across all product types, the life insurance market paid out more than S$5bn to policyholders and beneficiaries in 2017, with health insurance premiums also totalling S$374mn for YTD Q42017. 90
Singaporeans are now living to over 80 years of age, where longer lifespans, rising healthcare costs and an increased demand for new digital tools have placed increased pressures on existing insurance incumbents As part of the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s efforts to attract foreign investment to further ignite its economy, insurtech startups have brought new business models to the table, as well as new digital technologies, such as chatbots and mobile apps, helping insurance giants to step up to the challenge and remain competitive. Transforming its service delivery across an entire gamut of insurance services, from Life & Savings, to Health and Property & Casualty, AXA Group has invested in overhauling its outdated processes and adopting a new digital approach in order to cater towards this growing demand. FEBRUARY 2019
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AXA SINGAPORE
“ We are very proud of our digital transformation projects, where we have up to 90% adoption rate on our sales” — Eric Lelyon, Chief Operating Officer 92
“Every one of our competitors is
well as its IT and transformation
utilising self-service tools. At AXA
projects, Lelyon has also sought to
Singapore, we deal with all lines of
protect customer data as part of his
business,” explains Eric Lelyon, Chief
role as Data Privacy Officer. As the
Operating Officer, AXA Singapore.
customer’s need for personalised,
“We have competitors within life
digital services continue to grow at
insurance and general insurance, such
scale, it will remain imperative for AXA
as motor, travel, home and health, but
to adopt customer-centric engage-
all of them are trying to sell directly to
ment strategies to win and retain the
the consumer or tying up with partners
trust of its customers, and embed a
to create a digital ecosystem.”
blended approach in delivering person-
Responsible for insurance policy, AXA’s local customer call centre, as FEBRUARY 2019
alised products and services at a corporate and individual level.
ASIA
CLICK TO WATCH : AXA IN REAL LIFE REPORT 93
“In Singapore, our life insurance
choices and convenience for custom-
segment has been auto-equipped
ers. We are equipping our sales force
with Digital technologies across sales,
with innovative digital tools to engage
services and marketing. We are very
and close a case with customers in
proud of our digital transformation
minutes,� he says.
projects, where we have up to 90%
In order to reduce paperwork and
adoption rate on our sales tool. Our
enable faster policy issuance turna-
agents are selling most of our prod-
round, the business has therefore
ucts online, which will bring significant
worked to overhaul its backend
advantages. The next step for us will
capabilities and upgraded its outdated
be an offline version, which we will be
systems to provide not only cost-effi-
launching shortly, enabling agents to
ciency, but to minimise human error
sell faster, better and offer more
and deliver exceptional support to w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
121 System
An award-winning Point-of-Sale platform used by leading insurers to complete their end-to-end sales and service journeys
Financial Needs Analysis
Product Recommendation & Quotation
Product Comparison
Application & Submission
Underwriting
Policy Issuance
Sell insurance anytime, anywhere with/without internet
Speedy policy issuance
Simple and intuitive user experience & interface
Paperless Straight Through Processing (STP)
Fast insurance product configuration & launch
Ensure regulatory compliance
End-to-end sales processes
Cross platform iOS/ Android/Web
sales@eabsystems.com +852 2576 6000 www.eabsystems.com
ASIA
95
its digital savvy customers. “There was a lot of transformation
customers. By taking an in-depth look at its distribution models, it has overhauled
in the backend because we didn’t need
a number of its processes, leveraging
anyone to do the processing anymore,
new technologies along the way.
but we did need to factor in regulatory
“With our life insurance, our agents
checks. However, we are now looking
make up more than two thirds of the
to change our back-end system as
business. We also sell insurance to the
well, for a system more flexible and
post offices, for example, as well as
cheaper to implement a new product,”
financial advisors (FA). We are also
states Lelyon.
exploring the increased value of APIs
Reducing its dependence on legacy
through an Insurance as a Service
systems and bringing a complete
proposition. We can do much more
omnichannel experience to the table,
on the General Insurance side, selling
AXA has sought to fully empower its
direct to the customer through the w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
AXA SINGAPORE
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FEBRUARY 2019
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AXA GROUP
€98.5bn Approximate revenue
1985 Year founded 160,000 The approximate number of AXA employees
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Power your onboarding processes. Empower your customers. Create a remarkable onboarding experience for your customers that offers realtime mobile engagement, the flexibility of anytime, anywhere self-service and omnichannel digital interactions. Combining capture, process management, e-signature and verification abilities, you create enduring customer loyalty and a competitive edge—all while ensuring compliance and automating due diligence.
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Watch this on-demand webinar to learn how to Employ onboarding best practices to win and wow customers
ASIA
“ With our life insurance, our agents make up more than two thirds of the business. We also sell insurance to the post offices, for example, as well as financial advisors (FA)” — Eric Lelyon, Chief Operating Officer
99
phone or through digital means, but the
ties of consumer data. Investing in
intermediary must always remain. We
the development of a new security
are investing in checking-up on the cus-
protocols to safeguard all data under
tomer, ascertaining their needs before
its portfolio, AXA has partnered with
moving to a business process,” he says.
KPMG, undertaking a number of
Investing in new technologies and
assessments to ensure its effective-
business processes, the growing
ness, as well as implemented cloud
number of cyber-attacks is an area of
technology to further secure all
focus which has remained firmly on top
customer-related information.
of the agenda for AXA. High-profile
However, such change is not without
breaches have led to increased fears
its challenges. Transforming its organi-
on an international scale, particularly
sational structure and processes has
for businesses which hold vast quanti-
no doubt led to a cultural seachange w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
AXA SINGAPORE
A X A S ING A P OR E
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Gaining double digit growth across all product types, the life insurance market in Singapore paid out more than S$5bn to policyholders and beneficiaries in 2017
AXA has sought to fully empower its customers. By taking an indepth look at its distribution models, it has overhauled its processes, leveraging new technologies along the way.
Singaporeans are now living to over 80 years of age, where longer lifespans, rising healthcare costs and an increased demand for new digital tools have placed increased pressures on traditional insurance companies
Two years ago, we rolled out an ambitious initiative locally for our front to back office transformation. We chose EAB Systems, HK as our lead system implementation partner and moved to the cloud for increased agility
AXA Group has invested in overhauling its outdated processes and adopting a new digital approach in order to cater towards this growing demand
We are utilising technologies from Kofax, Couchbase and Red Hat, choosing local software to complement our cloud-based solution
In order to reduce paperwork and enable faster claims turnaround, the business has worked to overhaul its backend capabilities to provide not only cost-efficiency, but to deliver exceptional support to its digital savvy customers
FEBRUARY 2019
We have onboarded about 1200 agents across different channels and launched all of AXA’s key products (21 in number) within an astounding one year time frame. We are now rolling this out across FA channel and this is the 1st time that AXA is opening STP solution for this group of distributors.
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102
at AXA, where the move towards digital
areas where we have the new operat-
integration has created a ripple effect
ing model and the old operating model
across its operations.
working next together, it is not efficient
“We are using this fantastic new tool to allow straight-forward process where there is a lot of change at the
with regards to cost efficiency,” explains Lelyon. “I am working with two hands – one
organisation and the people who are
is to be definitive to the lives of our
working for us. At the same time that
customers and to go faster to enable
we are launching this new tool we need
a positive customer experience. The
to decommission the legacy. We are
second is to do with cost control, where
eradicating all the old tools one by one
I am looking at this further. The work
which will make us more agile. None-
will show it really has been the teams
theless, because we’ve got so many
of people in our company that are
FEBRUARY 2019
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“ With an emphasis on innovation, AXA will continually make insurance personal and simple at every touch point, utilising omnichannel data and solutions to better address the current and future needs of its customers” — Eric Lelyon, Chief Operating Officer
103
really understanding this and where
more services to the customer, particu-
we are moving to.”
larly on the health side where we are
With an emphasis on innovation,
exploring a growing interest in health
AXA will continually make insurance
and wellness solutions. We are really
personal and simple at every touch
excited about transforming our IT
point, utilising omnichannel data and
ecosystem, build stronger relation-
solutions to better address the current
ships with our customers where we
and future needs of its customers,
can take care of them.”
moving from a payer to a partner. “What AXA is trying to move to is more servicing. We want to become a partner of the customer, rather than a payer,” notes Lelyon. “We want to offer w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
Generali: 104
A customer-centric insurance provider fuelled by digital disruption WRIT TEN BY
L AUR A MULL AN PRODUCED BY
A LE X PAGE
FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
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GENERALI
Generali has made a name for itself as one of largest global insurance providers. Now, it’s taking on one of its biggest digital transformations yet to sustain its customer-centric reputation
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W
orldwide, it seems the insurance sector is on the cusp of momentous change and nowhere can this be seen better than at
Assicurazioni Generali. Offering everything from corporate insurance to life and health insurance, Generali has quickly become a household name, often cited as being Europe’s third-largest insurer, the leading insurer in Italy and the second largest in Germany. Now, it’s earning its stripes for another key facet of the business: the further innovation and digital transformation process, as stated in the new Group Strategy. At its Global Corporate & Commercial division, a specialised unit within the company, Generali provides services such as property and casualty insurance to complex multinationals and large domestic commercial entities alike. Hayden Seach, Head of Global Corporate & Commercial Asia, is convinced that this digital transformation is not only FEBRUARY 2019
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107
helping the company better manage its portfolio and relationships, but it’s also helping it deliver more informed risk management to its clients. Historically, insurance has been associated with a product or contract between a customer and their insurance company covering risk. In stark contrast, Generali believes it offers services beyond this, going the extra mile to deliver a service-orientated experience for its customers. “We focus on providing service-led propositions,” Seach explains, “therefore we position w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
GENERALI
“ At Generali, our focus is on being agile, flexible and adaptable so we can meet the needs of our clients” Hayden Seach, Head of Generali Global Corporate & Commercial Asia
108
FEBRUARY 2019
ourselves as a company that responds to customers’ needs as a partner, rather than selling them an insurance policy or product.” Technology has undoubtedly been a key part of this strategy, and so Generali has devised a careful digital transformation plan to ensure its customers get the top-class service they deserve every time. “At Generali, our focus is on being agile,
ASIA
CLICK TO WATCH : ‘THE EMERGING RISK – GENERALI GROUP’ 109 flexible and adaptable so we can meet
a global level. Generali is also using
the needs of our clients in a timely
a customer relationship management
manner,” adds Seach.
(CRM) tool from Microsoft Dynamics
At GC&C, digital tools involve data
which allows it to manage and maintain
consolidation, business enablement,
customer relationships, track engage-
customer service and business
ments and sales, and deliver actionable
management. When it came to data,
data. Because Generali also provides
Seach says that the company “recog-
loss prevention and risk engineering
nised it had an enormous amount of
services to its customers, it has also
data available to it” as a multinational
utilised Maximo by IBM to make the
insurer but that it wasn’t effectively
related reports, actions and results
“leveraging this to its full potential”.
electronically available.
To promote data consolidation and
But data consolidation is only the
portfolio analytics, the business rolled
start. With its digitally-savvy mindset,
out a Corporate Data Warehouse at
Generali also plans to enable the w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
Trusted Digital Advisor We help insurers connect the dots across the globe and region – becoming customer-led, operationally smart Connected Enterprises
Anticipate tomorrow. Deliver today. kpmg.com/cn
Š 2019 KPMG Advisory (Hong Kong) Limited, a Hong Kong limited liability company and a member firm of the KPMG network of independent member firms affiliated with KPMG International Cooperative ("KPMG International"), a Swiss entity. All rights reserved. Printed in Hong Kong.
ASIA
business further with a home-grown
Underwriting Workbench which
system called Gen-e-risk, short for
supports the full underwriting process,
Generali eRisk system. “Providing
from request for quotation to the
multinational insurance solutions is
binding stage. In turn, Seach says this
a very complex process,” observes
will allow the firm to “deliver technical
Seach. “This system enables us
pricing, risk assessment and portfolio
to provide multinational insurance
management as well as offer geoloca-
solutions to large and complex
tion and tracking information”.
customers, across multiple territories,
Today, insurance businesses face
compliantly.” As part of its digital
a new hurdle: how to become more
transformation journey, Generali has
customer-centric. However, this seems
developed a new system called
to be a challenge which Generali is 111
E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Hayden Seach Hayden currently holds the position of Head of Asia; for Generali Global Corporate and Commercial. He is also a member of the Board of Future Generali (India) Insurance Company Limited. Hayden has worked in the Insurance Industry for 25 years, holding various global and country leadership positions. Other board memberships he has held include: Royal & Sun Alliance Insurance (Oman) SAOC, June 2010 — March 2011, Royal & Sun Alliance Insurance (Middle East) Limited EC (alt), February 2009 — March 2011, and Glencairn Group (South Africa), August 2005 — December 2007.
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tackling with ease. “We take the data-
and premiums status. Additionally, the
driven insights that we have from the
business is launching an Electronic
Corporate Data Warehouse and we
Policy Insurance service. Aligned with
present it back to the customer, allowing
its green strategy, this roll-out also
them to view the performance of their
aims to “promote better policy
business,” notes Seach. “This enables
documentation management for the
them to create better risk management
customer”, according to Seach.
of their own business.” “We are also just about to launch
The fourth component of Generali’s digital transformation journey lies in
a Client & Broker web portal,” he adds,
business management. By consolidat-
highlighting how the service will offer
ing its data, Seach says it helped to
a documentary repository and will also
bring “full transparency” to the busi-
provide details on service delivery
ness, allowing it to better manage and
FEBRUARY 2019
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“ We position ourselves as a company that responds to customers’ needs, rather than selling them an insurance policy or a product” Hayden Seach, Head of Generali Global Corporate & Commercial Asia
track the performance of areas of the business like production, underwriting and finance. “Internally it provided us with a much better portfolio management capability,” he says. “The transparency of our portfolio has really enabled us to focus on profitability and portfolio performance. We’ve got a whole customer view, which has enabled us to deliver better results for our shareholders.” “I think another thing that I’m really proud that we’ve managed to deliver w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
GENERALI
is a more informed risk management to our customers,” he adds. “Our customers are able to get the claims data analytics that we provide.” This has had real-life, tangible impacts for customers, he asserts, citing a major multinational hotel chain as one key beneficiary. “We were able to analyse and present to them incidents which were happening within their hotels around the world. So, for example, one hotel had a slip-and-fall problem at one of their buffet lines. Using data 114
analytics, we were able to isolate the cause of the problem and help them design a risk management control.” In this instance, it meant implementing a service attendant rather than having a self-service model to prevent spillages. Indeed, Generali Global Corporate & Commercial has taken a forwardthinking approach to innovation, tapping into some of the latest technology trends shaking up the market. However, when the pace of innovation progresses at a rate of knots, how does the company keep up? “At GC&C Asia we’ve leveraged partners like KPMG who have been a fantastic supporter to us throughout our FEBRUARY 2019
ASIA
journey,” Seach observes. “I think leveraging partnerships have really helped us drive our agenda as fast and effectively as the market requires.” But this isn’t the only challenge facing the company. Seach points out how his division also had to contend with legacy systems, the scale of change and the challenge of implementing this strategy worldwide. “It really requires a strong leadership focus to cascade this approach to the relevant teams within each of our businesses,” he says. It’s this strong guidance which will help the company it navigates a realm of new emerging technologies and strategies. “Leveraging robotics and other
“ We’ve leveraged partners like KPMG who have been a fantastic supporter to us throughout our journey” Hayden Seach, Head of Generali Global Corporate & Commercial Asia
emerging technology is the next phase,” notes Seach. “Our value proposition requires a lot of analytics and feedback to our customers and we can’t underestimate the amount of work that goes into that. This technology will reduce the turnaround and customers will be able to receive more live-time data feedback on incidents so they can manage their own risks and exposures more effectively.” In the world of insurance, compliance is paramount and whilst Generali is already using w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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GENERALI
160
Countries completed insurance solutions 116
71,000 Employees
1831
Year founded
FEBRUARY 2019
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tools like its CRM system and constant reviews to safeguard this, Seach highlights how the company is also exploring the use of robotics and artificial intelligence (AI) for the future. Change is underfoot at Generali: the company is investigating the use of trailblazing new technologies and is working hard to nurture the right culture necessary for change but ultimately, for Seach and his team, the most important thing is to remain laser-focused on its service-led customer experience. “Our service beyond policy approach is something that we’re really proud of within Global Corporate & Commercial,” Seach reflects. “Looking forward, if we can continue to be the best deliverer of corporate insurance to our customer that would be something that I would be delighted with.” In order to do this, technology is set to be a vital part of Generali’s future strategy, but when the end-goal is customer-centricity, it’s by no means a silver bullet. Seach affirms that whilst technology is a “clear enabler” which can help make the company more customer-centric, it won’t ever “replace the face-to-face environments that we’ve prided ourselves on here at Generali”.
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Technology transformation to remain a trusted partner WRIT TEN BY
OLIVIA MINNOCK PRODUCED BY
JA MES PEPPER
w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
S A N TA N D E R
Banking behemoth Santander is undergoing a significant digital transformation in an evolving industry –– Andy Pearson and David Hayes explain how this improves the lives of customers and communities 120
P
art of the global Santander Group, Santander UK has become a mainstay of British banking, and is
a familiar sight on the UK high street with over 1,000 branches and 50 corporate business centres across the nation. Now, the finance giant is undergoing a significant digital transformation in order to improve the lives of its customers and their communities. Keen to explain this transformation and what it means to the bank were David Hayes, Chief Data Officer and Head of Data Services; and Andy Pearson, Managing Director of Santander UK Technology and Head of Digital Services. We caught up with the pair at Santander UK’s Milton Keynes office. Known throughout the UK as a ‘new town’ built almost from scratch just 50 years ago, Milton Keynes has a reputation for cuttingFEBRUARY 2019
FINTECH
edge modernity and so the location, as well as the office itself which has been revamped with colourful open spaces and well-lit breakout areas to promote collaboration between staff, truly reflects Santander’s personality as a decades-old institution which is still tech-driven and keenly keeps up with a changing sector and the rapid development of customer demands.
AN EVOLVING INDUSTRY Technology is disrupting every industry, and banking is no exception – but with organisations like Santander forming such an integral part of everyday life, present at key moments and within communities, this throws up unique challenges and opportunities in the sector. Hayes comments on the recent transformation of the industry: “Data has become prominent for many reasons. Here in banking, there’s a whole world of data at our fingertips that can help us improve the lives of our customers.” The entire industry is adapting to new technology, and indeed Hayes is an active participant in national organisation DataIQ Leaders as well as FIMA, an annual European conference on financial information management. Hayes also recently spoke to the Bank of England about how Santander leverages Big Data among other disruptive technologies. w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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Transforming businesses to lead in the digital data economy New data solution gives faster answers.
everis is a multinational strategy and technology consultancy - part of the NTT DATA network. We transform companies through technology and business consulting; by creating efficiencies with emerging technologies, rationalising infrastructures and optimising processes. We work in a multitude of sectors, amongst them are the banking and financial sectors, of which we present a recent solution.
Scenario
Some companies operate in highly regulated environments. For example, banking companies need to report on their deposit funds to the FSCS (Financial Services Compensation Scheme) to ensure their customers are covered in case of bankruptcy.
Challenge
everis was faced with a complex task: to create a unified and aggregated view of customers and products across multiple OpCos & large product portfolio scenarios. Many banking institutions do not have access to a golden customer or product record, and therefore joining disparate data sets is laborious and slow. In addition to this challenge is the regulator’s demanding SLA and required level of guaranteed accuracy for this unified view.
www.everis.com
Solution
In answer to the challenge, everis developed a new advanced Data Platform that provides a toolset and methodology to develop and deploy new data use cases. This toolset utilises the latest data & analytics technologies, which provide rapid and powerful results. We underpinned deployment automation with an integrated platform support service, ensuring reliable and faster delivery and operation of the new data asset. This new platform has been the backbone of multiple successful data transformation and regulatory reporting projects providing efficiency and scalability.
Benefits
• Generation of an integrated view of customers across multiple business entities and platforms. • Improvement on the regulator’s SLA:80% reduction (from 3 days to less than 8 hours) of the total elapsed time in report processing involving 40 millions of clients, 200 millions of contracts and 1 billion records on the SLA. • Technological methodology and assets which foster increased productivity, consistency & extensibility. • Industrialised services definition, to accelerate the migration of new use cases to the platform.
VISIT OUR WEBSITE
FINTECH
“ Customers are used to using Instagram and Facebook –– they’re used to instantaneous responses, so we need to be able to provide that. Our goal is to give a seamless, transparent journey to our customers” — Andy Pearson, Managing Director, Santander UK Technology
fundamental to banking and fundamental to what we do here. Our aspiration is to be the best open digital bank so we need to stay abreast of the latest developments and adapt to new ways of working, and be responsive to what the market and the customer needs.” Pearson cites two key elements of technology transformation: “One is how we interact with our customers – and the changes in the way we’re building applications for mobile… we’re looking to digitise the way we interact with our customers.” However, the second element comes from within: “We also need the right data at the back end, and to explore that data to make
“They’re on a very similar journey to us,
sure those interactions are as mean-
and were keen to discuss some cultural
ingful and insightful for our customers
and principle things Santander is doing
as they can be.
that they can learn from. As a whole, the
“Data is fundamental to both of these
banking industry is really taking these
things, and as we move forward increas-
technologies on,” he adds.
ing our understanding of data through AI and machine learning is key,” he
A TECHNOLOGY FOCUSED INSTITUTION
adds. “Customers are used to using
Santander is taking these industry
Instagram and Facebook – they’re
changes in its stride, all the while
used to instantaneous responses, so
focusing on the most important
we need to be able to provide that. Our
aspect: customer experience. As
goal is to give a seamless, transparent
Pearson explains: “Technology is
journey to our customers.” w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
125
S A N TA N D E R
ALL ABOUT THE DATA Gathering as much data as possible can help to improve this customer journey – but only if the right tools are in place to make use of it. “Data gives us the ability to analyse and understand how our customers interact with us, so we can design processes more effectively,” Pearson explains. Within Santander too, it’s the data that makes the difference. “Big data has been absolutely transformational to us as an organisation. We partner with Cloudera to run our big data platform here in Santander UK. I was able 126
to understand through this collaboration that we don’t need to have silos of data going E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Andy Pearson is the Managing Director of Santander UK Technology Engineering and Head of Digital Services. After a successful career in consultancy, he joined Santander in 2006 and held senior roles in IT during Santander’s integration of other UK banks. In 2015 he took the lead of the engineering and delivery division which he brought into the digital era. Now, Pearson is driving the transformation of Santander UK into an agile organisation bringing the business, operations and technology teams together under a domain-driven and service-driven model.
FEBRUARY 2019
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127
forward – and if you get rid of silos, you
A TRUSTED MEMBER OF THE COMMUNITY
can truly transform the way people
“Communities are really important to
across the organisation behave.”
us in Santander,” Hayes emphases.
Santander’s use of data reflects its
“Santander has targets to make sure
commitment to its customers, as well as
everyone takes part in community work,
how integral a part the bank plays in
be that abroad or locally.” Indeed,
people’s everyday lives and in wider
recently a group from the Milton Keynes
communities. “The human element is
office returned from building classrooms
really key, particularly if you’re making
in Cambodia, whilst raising money for
difficult financial decisions,” says Hayes.
charities closer to home, Age UK and
“If you’re going to take out a mortgage
Barnardo’s, and last year Hayes himself
which is going to shape your life and your
spent some time helping a local food
spending for the next 25 years, you need
bank. “The motivation you get from
to trust and know that you can rely on us.”
making a real difference in your local w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
FINTECH
CLICK TO WATCH : ‘TRUST IN BANKING AT SANTANDER UK WITH CDO DAVID HAYES AND MD ANDY PEARSON’ 129 area is great, and is very healthy for an
in different parts of the organisation.”
organisation like Santander,” he adds.
This commitment to communities
In addition, Santander as a global
reflects the trust which Pearson is keen
organisation is busy strengthening its
to emphasise as integral to Santander.
commitment to the UK with a revamp
“Trust is a really strong foundation – secu-
of its Milton Keynes site and a brand-
rity is important because our customers
new £75mn office in Bootle, Liverpool,
have entrusted us with their information.
which is set to house 2,500 staff. “These
Security is fundamental for any bank,”
are historic sites for Alliance and
he explains. “We have a design principle
Leicester and Abbey National. The UK
of building security from the bottom up,
bank is one of the biggest elements
and going forward the banking industry
of the Santander group and we’re very
has the opportunity to build on that trust.
committed to our UK base,” Hayes
There are new value propositions we can
explains. “We’ve got 14mn active
explore here, and indeed for the wider
customers here and over 20,000 staff
banking industry, to provide identity w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
S A N TA N D E R
management for the wider market. “Customers are trusting us with their data. We need to verify identities for a whole variety of regions – so there are opportunities for a bank as that trusted partner within the wider industry, and that’s something we need to look at going forward.” This strong culture of trust, community and collaboration runs through every aspect of the business, not least the relationship Santander maintains with its vendors and partners, all of which have equally stringent principles on security and much more. 130 “When we work with a third party, we try to make sure we work in partnership with them,” he emphasises. “We spend a fair bit of time making sure they have the right fit for us, both culturally and architecturally.” “Part of our methodology is to see, experiment, improve concepts, test and learn before we take a leap into particular technologies,” says Pearson. “Experimentation and building that collaborative relationship is important in understanding we’re working with the right partners moving forward.” Alongside Cloudera, a leading platform for Big Data and data science which enables Santander to become data driven, the bank works with a variety of carefully selected partners that have been critical for its ongoing digital transformation. FEBRUARY 2019
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This includes Microstrategy, which provides an enterprise wide platform for Business Intelligence (BI) and analytics; NuoDB, a cloud database for digital applications that can run on premise; Pivotal, a technology development company that provides platforms and tools enabling organisations to develop digital experiences; and Everis, a consultancy providing business and technology solutions for mission critical challenges.
THE RIGHT CULTURE Throughout the significant technology transformation Santander continues to undergo within a changing industry, its E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
David Hayes is Santander UK Chief Data Officer and Head of Data Services. He is a recognised leader in the data industry with a long career in different areas of Santander UK. He has been driving the cultural change about data in Santander UK since he was appointed as CDO in 2014. Hayes is passionate about what data can do to create value for customers and communities and thus is transforming data into a commonplace asset that everyone in Santander can use to help customers, always with the utmost awareness to governance, privacy and security.
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131
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CLICK TO WATCH : ‘ANDY PEARSON, MANAGING DIRECTOR OF SANTANDER UK TALKS TECHNOLOGY TRANSFORMATION’ 133 people remain key, and managing the significant culture changes transforma-
brought together to drive change.” Ensuring that these skills are in place
tion brings is vital. “It’s easy to underes-
across the organisation, Santander is
timate the amount of impact that cultural
also committed to diversity, such as
change has on the ability to make
ensuring a mix of men and women in the
technology change,” Hayes reflects.
tech-led organisation. “Gender diversity
“We run change management pro-
is very important to us,” says Pearson.
grammes and provide training, but of
“We were a founding signatory of the
course we have some way to go. We’re
HMRC Women in Finance Charter. We
on a journey. One thing we have to do
know that in the industry about 17-20%
is to articulate data as a profession;
of roles in technology are filled by women.
understand and appreciate the different
We’re fortunate that we have about 30%
elements of that. There are very
of our roles filled by women – however,
different skillsets that come in – soft
we currently only have 19% in senior
skills and technical skills need to be
roles, so our goal is to get that to 25% w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
S A N TA N D E R
Cloud. Containers.
Culture.
Transform your business, not just your IT.
FINTECH
135 by 2022. Role models are very important,” he adds. “We are participating in the Thirty Per Cent Coalition where we have role models, both men and women, to mentor women in our organisation, and women at Santander are being mentored by those from other organisations.”
TECHNOLOGIES OF THE FUTURE In addition to Big Data being fundamental to Santander’s offering and the care it can provide each and every customer and community, the bank will continue to explore other technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
S A N TA N D E R
capabilities and more. “Machine learning
learning. Now we have that core data
is a technology we’re exploring with some
platform, that’s going to allow us to
gusto at Santander,” says Hayes. “So far,
explore these new technologies
it’s been important from an operational
increasingly as we go forward.”
efficiency perspective. It’s going to change the way we work, the way we
community all keep a finger on the pulse
think, the decisions we go through, the
of new developments in the evolving
speed at which we interact with our
industry, with Open Banking set to take
customers and the offering we can give
centre stage. “That changes the game
them – but to embed machine learning
for us,” says Hayes. “Data is an asset
we need to make sure it’s built with great
and this allows competitors to build on
data engineering to sit behind it.”
assets we’ve got – when you then throw
Pearson adds: “Establishing our big 136
Hayes, Pearson and the Santander
in the capability to build AI or run machine
data ecosystem is key to us. We’re still
learning algorithms, the opportunity
early on in our journey of AI and machine
through technology is massive.”
CLICK TO WATCH : ‘DAVID HAYES, HEAD OF DATA AT SANTANDER UK TALKS CHANGE CULTURE MANAGEMENT’
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“ Here in banking,there’s a whole world of data at our fingertips that can help us improve the lives of our customers” — David Hayes, CDO, Santander
137 Pearson, too, cites Open Banking as one of “a whole series of regulatory activities that are changing the face of
customers are and how to be more relevant in their day-to-day activities.” Overall, Hayes concludes that the
the banking industry”. He adds: “The
centuries-old banking industry will
making available of information about
fundamentally transform with Santander
customers to a whole range of new
at the fore. “I firmly believe that technol-
players is going to fundamentally change
ogy will completely change banking in
the way customers interact with financial
the next 20 years. The challenge for
organisations. There will be new players
the industry will be to embrace those
– and as a bank, we need to respond to
technologies – and the winners will be
that. We need to measure the experienc-
those who can do that in a way which is
es we build, and remain relevant for our
right for the customer.”
customers as we support their goals in life. Opening up banking data gives us opportunities to understand who our w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
ADYEN
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Adyen has witnessed exponential growth over the last four years and has recently launched its IPO in Amsterdam. Jussi Lindberg, SVP of Business Development in Northern Europe, tells us more WRITTEN BY
CATHERINE STURMAN
PRODUCED BY
JAMES PEPPER
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ADYEN
T
he payment service provider (PSP) market is booming. Mass globalisation has led consumers to demand
access to products and services with the ability to pay across a number of different channels at the click of a button. Tackling the challenges that businesses experience within this space is Adyen. Partnering with a number of popular streaming services, such as Facebook, Spotify, Netflix, and more, its integrated platform enables payments to be undertaken through 140
any channel and processed on a single platform. Such has been the relentlessness of the company’s growth, its processed volume growth has risen from €12bn ($14bn) on an annual basis to a staggering €108bn ($125bn) in 2017. Shares have also surged up to 90% upon the launch of its IPO in Europe. Four years previously, Senior Vice President of Business Development, Northern Europe, Jussi Lindberg, wanted to gain a greater understanding of how Adyen was setting itself apart from other payment providers. “When working at PayPal, Adyen was a partner that had the fastest growth ever when it came to the PSP space. I had to know what the secret sauce was. Why were they giving so much volume to us at PayPal? FEBRUARY 2019
CLICK TO WATCH : ‘‘W SVP OF BUSINES
WHAT IS ADYEN?’ JUSSI LINDBERG, SS DEVELOPMENT EXPLAINS’
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After working a bit more closely with Adyen I found the company was really something extraordinary,” he explains. “Adyen was building something more quickly than anybody else, but at the same time helping businesses globally scale in a different manner than anyone had been doing previously.” Shortly after, Lindberg joined the company in 2014.
OUTSTANDING COLLABORATION Working with businesses as a payments partner, Adyen seeks to w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
OMNICHANNEL. REDEFINED. Enable AfterPay and allow your consumers to pay frictionless in any touch point you want. One off transactions, consolidated or subscription based transactions, it’s all up to you. *The image above is a conceptual sketch.
WILL YOUR BRAND BE RUN OVER BY A SELF-DRIVEN CAR? How can a self-driving car affect my brand you might wonder? And it’s a valid question. The answer lies in how everything changes when we move from the driver’s seat to the passenger seat.
No. This level of experience effectively hides all transactions, invisible payments, and to some extent the service providers as well. That can sound pretty scary in a world where the biggest struggle is to not just be seen – but remembered.
Not like the commuting of today – with people going from one place to another with occasional stops in
There is a solution, though. Pay After Delivery, PAD.
between – but in an AI powered vehicle that is perfectly aware of your interests, schedule and needs.
What started as a consumer need driven by skepticism about online purchases, and then evolved to a pre-filled
“That can sound pretty scary in a world where the biggest struggle is to not just be seen – but remembered” Imagine an ordinary day, you leave your home and get into ‘your’ car. You sit down and get into prepping your day at the office, in the car that is fitted to support focused working. Then your car stops by Starbucks and rolls down your window. The staff hand you your freshly made morning coffee, just as you like it. The car rolls away as you finish off the last of your prep as you sip your coffee looking out the window. After work the car picks you up again. As you summarize the day the car quietly stops by the grocery store, and a bag with your home essentials is placed in the trunk. Finally, you are home, work done, shopping done and a nice evening with your family lies ahead.
mobile first conversion driver. Pay After Delivery is now entering its third phase of relevance thanks to its perfect fit for consolidating invisible payments and support for subscription based business models. In addition, it brings with it a new platform for merchants to promote brand awareness and loyalty: the post purchase experience. This gives you as a merchant extraordinary exposure to the consumers’ eye, where others are invisible. Whether it’s the coffee in your car, in a shop or your intelligent washing machine ordering a detergent refill, Pay After Delivery is a payment method that will increase in relevance the more your business addresses the omnichannel challenges. No expiring cards. No 3D Secure validation. No obstacles, and your brand stands out. Can you afford not to employ a PAD service?
Does it sound like science fiction? Really? Remember back in 2006 – before the iPhone was launched – if I had told you that the phone would be the most important platform for shopping…? Today major car companies are partnering up with merchants to provide all of the above and more. Business models are changing. Consolidation and Subscription is the name of the game. So what does this have to do with your brand? Well, did you note any passages saying “and then you leaned out the window to pay”?
Patrik Vikner Head of User Experience – AfterPay
ADYEN
“ When working at PayPal, Adyen was a partner that had the fastest growth ever when it came to the PSP space. I had to know what the secret sauce was” — JUSSI LINDBERG, Senior Vice President of Business Development, Northern Europe
144
collaborate with them to plan how they
equates to 120 different vendor
can successfully scale.
relations, technical connections, and
“Businesses want to take the next future step to sell anywhere, at any
also reporting lines. “This is just not feasible as nobody
time, via any channel to anyone
has the bandwidth to take this on,
globally. So, the world is shrinking,”
especially in the payment space,” he
says Lindberg.
adds. “Companies want to be focusing
“We’re also seeing consolidation in
on increasing net promoter scores;
the types of vendors. Beforehand, the
ensuring conversions go up and be
payment space was very fragmented,
more in tune to what they are actually
where you had one gateway or
doing, which is taking care of
payment method per country that you
customers instead of vendor rela-
had to contract. If merchants were
tions. This is where we’re seeing
selling in 40 different countries, that
tremendous growth.
FEBRUARY 2019
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ADYEN
“Thirdly, we are seeing something
“New regulations are also coming up
contradictory, which is more fragmen-
so the world is still fragmented, making
tation,” he continues.
it important for us to be a partner where
“Whilst the world is getting smaller at one end, local initiatives offering new
we have control and give the best advice to our customers and partners.”
ways to pay are continuing to pop up. Today, I’m based in Sweden and, for
COMPLEX REGULATIONS
instance, have four or five payment
Building a new, state-of-the-art
methods that we have to integrate at
infrastructure, any type of transaction
Adyen instead of our customers having
placed through Adyen’s platform is highly
to do this.
secure, but unusually, is not sent to a third party. Instead, the business sends
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“ After working a bit more closely with Adyen I found the company was really something extraordinary” — JUSSI LINDBERG Senior Vice President of Business Development, Northern Europe
this directly to the required payment method and receives an immediate response back. Through this, Adyen has gained improved authorisation rates against its competitors. “We can also process payments in store on the same, single platform. From a technical standpoint, our solution is quite complex but we’re making it easy on the customer and partner side,”
Adyen have partnered with streaming giants such as Spotify
explains Lindberg. Additionally, with General Data Protection Regulations (GDPR) coming into force across Europe, Lindberg explains that whilst the company is fully up and running and is set to adhere to the vast changes to traditional regulatory requirements, the business will remain challenged.
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C OMPA N Y FA C T S
• Adyen has partnered with a number of popular streaming services, such as Facebook, Spotify and Netflix • Adyen’s integrated platform enables payments to be undertaken through a single platform. • Adyen’s processed volume growth has risen from €12bn ($14bn) on an annual basis to a staggering €108bn ($125bn) in 2017 • Shares have surged up to 90% upon the launch of its IPO in Europe
“We are GDPR ready and will take
• Adyen is backed by Index Ventures and Silicon Valley giant Iconiq Capital • Adyen has recently launched its IPO in the Netherlands • Adyen offers every payment method available in China, such as WeChat Pay and Alipay outside of the country, in order to cater to its specific target audience • Adyen uses data and machine learning in its payment routing, optimising authorisation rates
be PSD2 and GDPR ready, we only
full responsibility on what is put on us
have to do it once per region because
as a company at our end. Then, of
we have a single platform. For them,
course, it is up to any company that we
they have to do it over and over again,
are also partnering with to do their part
which slows our competition down.”
as well,” he says. “We are also Payment Service
Entering new markets Providing popular music juggernaut
Directive 2 (PSD2) ready. If we are
Spotify with a payment processing
talking about payments and what is
platform for its premiums business,
happening in the payment space, there
Adyen has fully supported the firm to
are a lot of acquisitions, which also
scale and enter new markets. With
house multiple platforms to send
a number of different payment details,
payment data through.
varying music catalogues and rights
“Whilst it’s trickier for competition to
dependent on each country in which it w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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serves, Adyen has strived to ensure that premium users can only tap into the catalogues relating to the country where the card (and user) resides. The business also caters to companies which have complex regulations to deal with. China, for instance, is a particular focus and houses a unique payments market. With this in mind, Adyen offers several Chinese payment methods, such as WeChat Pay and Alipay outside of the country, in order to cater to this specific target audience. 148
“No business without a local or offer Chinese payment methods. Adyen and other payment vendors cannot sell or target Chinese companies. On the other hand, we can help Chinese companies that want to sell outside of China, such as in the US, with this payment method,” says Lindberg.
SUPPORTING COMPANIES TO SCALE Whilst more and more companies are wanting to be on top of their payment data, Adyen’s platform will provide a better payment experience. Its technology has also worked to support retailers such as Daniel Wellington as well as ride-hailing FEBRUARY 2019
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while in store. A Unified Commerce approach allows retailers to reshape the purchase experience, making it frictionless. Adyen also aims to simplify and improve the payments experience on the merchant side. Adyen MarketPay, a solution for large marketplaces, simplifies the flow of payments, providing split payouts, easier report-
Jussi Lindberg, Senior Vice President of Business Development at ADYEN on Market Pay
ing, driving a complete frictionless experience for both vendors and end-customers. “There is complexity with not only accepting a payment, but sometimes
company Uber. Most importantly, delivering simplifi-
splitting a payment between multiple sellers. With more than one vendor,
cation for its customers, particularly
transactions need to be split evenly,
within the physical point of sale (POS)
and sometimes sellers also have
space means that Adyen has a unique
different commission plans,” explains
Unified Commerce offering. By having
Lindberg.
e-commerce and in-store payments
“Before, transactions had to be
processed through one platform,
initiated not only once, but twice to
companies are able to create better,
make sure that this transactional
more personalised customer journeys
split was happening. Today, we can
such as click-and-collect, where
completely automate this with our
customers can order something online
MarketPay API solution.”
and pick it up in store, or endless aisles,
Such solutions are therefore in
where in-store tablets let shoppers
significant demand for big consumer-
order items that are out of stock online
driven companies such as Etsy or w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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150
“We’re seeing consolidation in the types of vendors. Beforehand, the payment space was very fragmented, where you had one gateway or payment method per country that you had to contract. If merchants were selling in 40 different countries, that equates to 120 different vendor relations, technical connections, but also reporting lines” — JUSSI LINDBERG Senior Vice President of Business Development, Northern Europe
eBay, where payment systems are becoming increasingly complex. Whilst there might be multiple sellers in one transaction trying to sell an item purchased by a consumer, upon completion, merchants then submit the relevant consumer details. “This is unique to Adyen and that’s what’s really driving the market solution and appealing to merchants,” Lindberg says. “There’s no exclusivity, so we can replicate these solutions to other vendors.” Furthermore, to bolster its efforts to reduce potential risks, Adyen uses data and machine learning in its payment routing, optimising authorisation rates. “It’s not only a machine learning tool, it’s also how we interpret the different types of risks that we are associating with different types of transactions,” adds Lindberg. “With just one state-of-the-art platform, we can check transactions once, and then once it gets back from the payment team we also check it again. This supports enterprise merchants who want to be gathering more data and be cross-linking transactions that occur.
FEBRUARY 2019
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“They can then detect patterns of
partnering with our customers more
cross-linking different multiple
closely we’re getting more insights. It’s
email accounts and different cards,”
about analysing all payment methods,
he continues.
not gathering them. We can have better
“If they’ve been associated with card
risk tools and better risk analysis per
washing, for example, in seconds we
country and per business vertical where
can see thousands of transactions with
they are selling.”
a stolen card number. We can efficiently
Partnering with some of the largest
block this, but if we can also show this
retailers and enterprise clients globally,
in a graphical way, this is something
Adyen has grown alongside its
deeply appreciated.”
customers, becoming a key factor to
Nonetheless, he adds that checking what could be a real transaction against
their success. “We have great technology and
ones which are fraudulent, remains
we’re very fun to work with. From the
a challenge.
start, we set out ambitious goals to
“It’s a tricky threshold, but as we’re
solve global businesses’ needs to
E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Jussi Lindberg is the SVP of Business Development Northern Europe at Adyen, the payments platform behind many of the world’s leading companies such as Uber, Netf lix, Spotify and eBay. Jussi was previously responsible for partnerships and financial products at PayPal and Ebay, with over 15 years of experience of partnering with hundreds of companies to achieve growth and digital performance. Jussi holds a Master of Science in Business Administration and Economist from UMA.
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simplify any type of sales channel, wherever they might be present. We have gained extensive payment knowledge from different regions in every office where we’re represented today and have local experts in these areas,” concludes Lindberg. “We can provide so many payment methods in just one integration but the work is still not done. The world is not covered. There’s no need that is 100% fully met. So, I think our journey is still just beginning. Looking 152
at the physical point of sales space, there’s still so much to do and so many store initiatives that we are fortunate enough to be building out together with our customers. It’s going to be really fun to see what the future brings.”
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— JUSSI LINDBERG Senior Vice President of Business Development, Northern Europe
EUROPE
2006
Year founded
668
Approximate number of employees
153
Adyen’s Senior Vice President of Business Development on TRENDS in the Payment World
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MONETA MONEY BANK: DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION FOR THE NEW BANKING CUSTOMER WRIT TEN BY
DA LE BENTON PRODUCED BY
JA MES PEPPER
w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
M O N E TA M O N E Y B A N K
Through a fast-pacing digital transformation, MONETA Money Bank embraces technology for the customers of tomorrow
T
echnology continues
how technology is truly disrupt-
to define and redefine
ing the way the financial industry
the modern world and
works with and exceeds its
industry sectors have to invest to not only keep up with the 156
customer expectations. “The very role of the CIO is
rapidly evolving marketplace,
changing dramatically,” he says.
but to stay ahead of the curve.
“It’s moved away from focusing
This is certainly the driving force
on cost-effective solutions and
behind an ambitious company-
executing historical processes to
wide digital transformation of the
become far more aligned and
Czech Republic-based MONETA
integral to the business.
Money Bank. Spearheading this
“It’s about understanding, end
digital transformation in terms of
to end, what customers’ needs
information technologies is
are and executing that more
Vladimir Klein, Chief Informa-
collaboratively with the business.
tion Officer (CIO).
The traditional borders between
Having worked for a number of technology-based service delivery
black box IT and business do not exist anymore.”
organisations throughout an
No transformational journey,
extensive career, Klein has vast
especially one defined by technol-
experience and understanding of
ogy, can ever truly end. It has to
FEBRUARY 2019
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157
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EUROPE
continuously evolve with the along-
ture and adopting an agile way of
side technologies and customers.
working simultaneously, Klein feels this
MONETA has set a target for 40% of
has proven key in maintaining opera-
its all core products to be distributed
tional clarity.
online or digitally through a number of
“You have to have more of an entrepreneurial way of thinking and
channels by 2020. A transformation of this size and
have an agile mindset towards develop-
scope is not without its challenges,
ing software or solutions,” he says.
and for an organisation that has been
“With the proper IT strategy behind us it
operating for two decades the biggest
becomes far easier to understand
challenge is complex architecture.
where to move, how to move and how
“If you don’t have proper architec-
to get people on board for changes. On
ture in place then you cannot develop
our transformation journey we decided
at any real pace,” says Klein. “The
to focus on 5 areas – Agile way of
same with automation: you cannot
working, Cloud, Automation, application
automate without agile architecture
replacements and Data”
and so we decided to develop and
With a digital transformation, one could be forgiven for focusing entirely
digitise in parallel.” In both developing the IT infrastruc-
on the technologies and the solutions
E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Vladimir Klein Senior executive with 25 years experiences in Information technology, banking and telecommunications. Vladimir Klein has been working in several countries, in different local or international managerial positions. He executed several transformational changes in his career in the area of M&A, outsourcing, digital and agile, cloud implementations, organizational restructuring, cost cuttings and core applications migration.
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“ It’s about understanding end to end what customers’ needs are and executing that more collaboratively with the business. The traditional borders between black box IT and business do not exist anymore” — Vladimir Klein, Chief Information Officer
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M O N E TA M O N E Y B A N K
driving the digitisation – but a tool is just a tool unless it’s in the hands of the right person. MONETA invests heavily in its development strategy to ensure that its people can help execute and deliver the best possible service to the end customer, whilst ensuring those same people are empowered and buy into this transformational journey. This proves crucial in the changing of cultural mindsets as the company shifts towards an agile, innovative way of working and this is where Klein can not only call on his own experience in the industry but also external partners to understand how to implement change to enable greater efficiency. 162
“We’ve started rolling out agile workshops and brought in external coaches and partners to share knowledge and best practice,” he says. “We have looked at how other companies have done it and we share that with our people in order for everyone to truly understand their role in pushing the company forward.” Klein admits that this in itself is a challenge as this new approach to working, one that will see each person define their own work and their own place in MONETA´s journey, can be met with some resistance and fear. This is where workshops and a strong sense of internal communication play a central role. Klein also empowers staff to make their own decisions. “Naturally for some people it’s very difficult because historically speaking, management will FEBRUARY 2019
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“ You have to have more of an entrepreneurial way of thinking and have an agile mindset towards developing software or solutions” — Vladimir Klein, Chief Information Officer
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make the final decision. I say: ‘you decide but try and think like a manager’,” he says. “This is where we combine communications, learning and workshops, and give them external support in order to seamlessly move forward together as a business.” A major part of MONETA’s transformation is moving towards cloud services which will drive a more agile way of working and in turn create a significantly more flexible business. To this end, MONETA is migrating significant amount of its legacy infrastructure over to a data centre. As part of this migration, Klein will oversee the integration of tens of physical
M O N E TA M O N E Y B A N K
applications to a cloud-based platform. As Klein notes, MONETA is a bank
integration platform, we selected Mitra
and not a developer and so the
quite simply because we did not have
company relies on a key strategic
the right level of competence to do it in
technology partner to assist and
house,” says Klein. “They brought us
support the company throughout this
competence and they provided us with
transition. MONETA has called upon
crucial support and implementation
the services of AWS for infrastructure
work. Going back to the complexity of
cloud, for automation products of
this migration, we have over 4500
RedHat and other open source tools
interfaces across all applications
like for example Jenkins or JUnit. As
which had to be integrated.
part of the Integration layer replacement,
164
“In replacing our entire legacy
“In my experience of similar transfor-
MONETA decided to cooperate with
mations at previous companies it’s
Mitra, a party which has many experi-
taken more than one year to make
ences in WSO2 integration platform.
some real headway. With the support of
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Mitra, we’re doing it in few months.” Ultimately, MONETA’s transformation
banking solutions. All of these developments are defined by one clear goal: to
is driven by the customer, and as
enable the most efficient and seamless
technology has evolved over the last
banking experience for customers.
two decades so too has the customer.
“Many customers today just want to
Through the advent of mobile payments,
do everything for themselves through
customers are more demanding than
tablets and mobile phones. They
ever before and for an organisation like
simply do not want to spend time by
MONETA it is crucial to stay ahead of
coming into a branch or contacting a
that demand in order to continue to
call centre. It is crucial that we are able
deliver and exceed expectations.
to handle their requests also fully
To this end, the company devel-
online,” says Klein. “That’s what our
oped an award-winning mobile
mobile app Smart Banka has been
banking application Smart Banka and
able to answer. Through it we can offer
is significantly revamping its online
the customer exactly what they need
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M O N E TA M O N E Y B A N K
anytime and from anywhere, but most importantly they can access it intuitively with no complications. Right now, we are looking to bring our web banking service to that same level.” Klein highlights the agile way of working again as key to being ready for this demand. This transformation has destroyed the historical barriers between IT and the wider business and brought about a more collaborative business, one that is better prepared to match this evolving landscape. The company has implemented daily stand-up meetings and sprints for all agile squads and moved away from a historical focus on long term delivery in order to make incremental steps on smaller things 166
today and therefore be ready for tomorrow. Key to this is instant customers feedback. “Customers can leave feedback in our Smart Banka app which we take directly to the backlog proposals and discussions with our teams and this is then taken into implementation,” says Klein. “The key points from the customer are directly implemented faster than ever before. “We even conduct research through our brokers. We do this by giving them a laptop or a tablet and they themselves give us feedback if they like it or don’t like it so they can sell our product. It’s all about understanding the end-to-end customer experience.” Klein entered MONETA back in December 2017 but even less than 12 months into this journey he can already point FEBRUARY 2019
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€400mn Approximate revenue
1994
Year founded
3000+ Approximate number of employees
M O N E TA M O N E Y B A N K
to significant success, be it through the mobile application, new customer portal or the migration own data centre to the hosted data centre and integration of AWS cloud into bank environment. Organizational changes were successfully executed in April this year to fit better to business value streams and cloud. Looking towards the future, Klein identifies ambitions to advance agile way of working to all IT Development staff and migrate next applications into AWS cloud with possibility to close a second data centre. Next his focus remains very much on legacy application replacements as 168
migration of card system to the partner cloud and migration and implementation of new web banking. “It’s about making our online banking solutions clearer for our customers, as well as opening it up and expanding it to our wider customer portfolio,” he says. “Banking is complex and there are certain elements surrounding interest rates and the different types of customer. What we want to be able to do is remove some of that complexity and make banking with MONETA simpler, easy and clearer for every single one of our customers.”
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“ Banking is complex and there are certain elements surrounding interest rates and the different types of customer. What we want to be able to do is remove some of that complexity and make banking with MONETA simpler, easy and clearer for every single one of our customers” — Vladimir Klein, Chief Information Officer
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AGILE, LEAN AND DEVOPS:
170
Learning from Nationwide’s digital disruption WRIT TEN BY
L AUR A MULL AN PRODUCED BY
ANDY TURNER
FEBRUARY 2019
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N AT I O N W I D E
By tapping into trailblazing new practices and methodologies, Nationwide has put its weight behind a mammoth transformation. We spoke to Guru Vasudeva, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Program and Application Services, to find out more
172
n the American insurance and
lines and financial services, this diversity
financial services markets,
has allowed Nationwide to carve a unique
Nationwide ranks amongst the
path as a one-stop shop for insurance.
best. Today, the Fortune 100 company
Though, as Guru Vasudeva, Senior Vice
stands as the number one company for
President and Chief Information Officer
total small business insurance, the
(CIO) of Program and Application
number one underwriter of farms and
Services, points out, the insurer’s
ranches, as well as the nation’s leading
competitive edge undoubtedly lies in its
pet insurer. But its list of accomplish-
customer-centric ethos. “Nationwide is
ments doesn’t stop there: it’s also the
a mutual company, which means our
8th largest provider of defined contribu-
customers own us,” Vasudeva explains.
tion plans, number 1 in 457 plans, the
“As the organization evolves, we are
8th largest life insurer and much more.
really focused on doing what is good
Spanning personal lines, commercial
for our customers, our employees and
I
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Agile
Lean 173
the communities where we operate.”
DevOps
Digitization is shaking up industries across the globe, and it seems the insurance and financial services sectors are no exception. Recognizing that its business is information-centric and reliant on IT, Nationwide has embarked
Continuous learning
on a root-and-branch digital transformation to ensure it can continue to deliver
turing arm of any financial services and
a world-class customer experience for
insurance company. Our Board and our
years to come. “The products that we
senior leadership recognized this a long
create are all information-based; they’re
time ago and, ever since, we have been
not products that you can touch and feel,”
on a journey to build a globally competi-
observes Vasudeva. “IT is the manufac-
tive IT capability inside Nationwide.” w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
Lean and Agile Partnership Journey with Nationwide TCS' Business 4.0 thought leadership framework, centered on agile methodologies, has helped clients like Nationwide Insurance to retain their leading position in their respective industries. Accelerated adoption of agile at Nationwide under the able leadership of Guru Vasudeva has been a great journey and we are proud of our role in delivering best-in-class thought leadership to Nationwide. Anupam Singhal Senior Vice President and Business Head, BFSI, TCS
The key value t enable state-of comprising dec measures. The for critical trans enabling with g upon the distri significant effic
As Nationwide Insurance Co Nationwide in their strategic Nationwide to scale up agile in-class talent and mature en of the distributed agile prog program delivery.
TCS is proud to have partnered with Nationwide in t work with the right partner. With its focus on the Bu the globe have chosen to partner with TCS to transf
TCS has set an enthusiastic vision of achieving Enterprise Agile by 2020 – a firstof-a-kind in terms of sheer scale and size. TCS’ Agile vision is founded on four pillars: workforce, workplace, service delivery partnership, and internal processes. In line with this vision, TCS has mobilized several small Agile teams for large transformations and delivered valuable outcomes at lightning speed besides helping over 2,000 clients to transition from project-only Agile to portfolio Agile and beyond. In addition, TCS has built the largest agile workforce in the world and created a world class agile coaching program to help bring about a mindset change across organizations. By codifying its experience of working with bluechip clients such as Nationwide Insurance Company, TCS has created a repository of compelling point of view articles on enterprise agile, location-independent agile, and agile contracting models. TCS’ success in helping organizations in their Agile transformation has been enabled by some key elements: § 100% agile workforce § TCSLivingAgile for mindset change § Visual radiators to replicate client agile environment § Collaboration tools to work in virtual co-located environments § Strong network of over 600 agile coaches § Empowered distributed teams – matching the right talent with the right role
that TCS brings to the agile journey of clients involves customizing agile practices and processes to f-the-art location independent agile delivery. This involves establishing a common delivery platform centralized team models, streamlined demand management, lean team structures and fact-based merger of agile practices enhances the certainty quotient needed to deliver time-to-market objectives sformation programs. With the increasing success of the distributed Agile delivery approach, TCS is global clients to transition from traditional time and material model to mature delivery models built ibuted Agile methodology. This has helped transform the way clients do business by delivering ciencies of scale and accelerating timelines to enable quicker time-to-market.
ompany’s strategic partner providing IT services for the past eight years, TCS has partnered with c enterprise agile journey under the leadership of Guru Vasudeva. As part of this journey, TCS helped e delivery by adapting to distributed agile delivery model, leveraging efficient delivery practices, bestngagement models. In this agile transformation journey, The ’One Team’ mindset, which was at the core gram, played a key role in making 16*5 business and IT delivery a reality thus leading to accelerated
this inspiring journey. TCS firmly believes that organizations can be successful in this journey if they usiness 4.0 framework with agile, automation, cloud and artificial intelligence at its core, clients across form into 'future ready' organizations.
N AT I O N W I D E
“ A lot of people have just done Lean or Agile, but I think by bringing these four strategies together we’ve done something unique” 176
— Guru Vasudeva, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Program and Application Services, Nationwide
Nationwide has put its weight behind
itself an ambitious goal to transform
this digital disruption since 2009. The
the way in which it develops software
company spends more than US$1.3bn
by blending four trailblazing strategies:
on IT every year, of which around
Agile, Lean, DevOps and continuous
$500mn is allocated to technology-
learning. This is no easy feat, and the
enabled transformation programs.
journey is far from over. But Guru is
It has also invested a huge amount of
certain that it will be a recipe for success.
software development, with around
“A lot of people have just done Lean or
5,000 to 6,000 full-time employees
Agile, but I think by bringing these four
and contractors writing complex
strategies together, we’ve done some-
code on a daily basis. To improve this
thing unique,” he notes. By releasing
mammoth process, Nationwide set
software faster and at a higher quality
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E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Guru Vasudeva is Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Program & Application Services at Nationwide, a $27 bn revenue financial services and insurance company. In this role, Vasudeva manages a shared services organization that provides program and project management, application development, and requirements and testing for the enterprise. He is also responsible for the delivery of large and complex programs, and Lean and Agile transformation of application development and maintenance functions across Nationwide.
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N AT I O N W I D E
for a lower cost, he says this plan hopes to not only help Nationwide achieve its business goals, but it will also reimagine the customer journey.
AN AGILE POWERHOUSE Keeping its finger on the pulse of the latest business strategies, Nationwide began its software development transformation a decade ago. In 2009, the firm centralized its IT function, sharing areas such as its data centers, infrastructure, security platforms and more. In fact, it also realized it could centralize and 178
optimize the methodology and practices used in software development – the same year, Nationwide made its first foray into Agile methodology. Whilst Agile wasn’t new, it was now broadly adopted across all its enterprises for the first time. For Guru, the next step was to see if Agile could work for large transformation programs. “Our experimentation with Agile goes back a long time ago when we had small teams experimenting with this methodology,” Vasudeva recalls. “But we wanted to see if we could scale Agile at an enterprise level. In other words, could we start using it for almost all software development?” “We brought these Agile teams together and asked them if they could harmonize the methodology. That’s because we believed FEBRUARY 2019
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CLICK TO WATCH : ‘PAYING BILLS ONLINE’ 179 that if you had a fine-tuned process then we could create a shared capability in which you could reuse the repeatable processes, methods and tools. It was really hard because people in these fields are very focused on their own version of Agile. But, in the end, it was very successful, and we began to slowly build our Agile development center.”
LEAN PROWESS But Agile was just the first building block in Nationwide’s transformation. Wanting to take this a step further, the insurer and financial services provider decided to scale w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
N AT I O N W I D E
its use of Agile substantially in 2011, so it employed Lean techniques to achieve this. Harking back to the early days of industrialization, Nationwide adopted the idea of a so-called “software development factory” complete with development teams that would finish one step needed to create code. Establishing clearly defined key roles for each development team (such as scrum master, tech lead, requirements lead and test lead) enabled the replication of best practices across the enterprise, as if it 180
were a factory. The insurer also implemented a visual management system, allowing developers to gain information on the shop floor quickly, as well as
$28bn in operating revenue
1926
Year founded
32,000
Approximate number of employees
Gemba Walks – a fundamental Lean management philosophy. “Gemba Walks enables leaders to visit the shop floor
could be used not only for computer
and to see first-hand the issues teams
programming languages like Java
are facing,” notes Vasudeva. “It allows
but could also be applied to Cobol,
information to flow from frontline teams
Packages and ETL code.
to senior management in real time.
This mammoth investment, Vasudeva
Leaders also become more enmeshed
says, was starting to pay off. By 2014,
within the workings of the factory instead
Nationwide’s Agile development teams
of managing it in a spreadsheet or a
had proven better quality and better
dashboard.” Wanting to scale this even
productivity using industry benchmarks,
further, Nationwide also showed that
and it had also created up to 50 develop-
these cutting-edge methodologies
ment teams. However, Agile methodol-
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181
ogy wasn’t entirely widespread, it only
these practices across all our soft-
covered less than 30% of software
ware development – that’s around
development at Nationwide. “We
US$60mn annually.” With this in mind,
conducted a Gartner benchmark that
Nationwide’s decision to scale these
showed that our Agile development line
methods enterprise-wide was an easy
was better than the industry standard
one to make. Today, the firm has
in terms of productivity, however
around 200 software development
Nationwide as a whole was still 7.8%
teams, almost all of which have adopted
worse in unit cost compared to the
this blend of Agile and Lean. Zeroing in
industry. We estimated that we could
on quality, productivity and time to
get close to 12% savings by adopting
market, Nationwide has also streamw w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
N AT I O N W I D E
lined its benchmark metrics, and today it can trace around US$60mn of savings on an annual basis. In its most recent benchmark in 2017, for instance, Nationwide reported 7.8% better unit costs – that’s a 15.6% increase compared to its benchmark from three years earlier.
DEVOPS MASTERY Not wanting to rest on its laurels, Nationwide decided to push its transformation further by tapping into DevOps. Emphasizing a shift in mindset, better 182
collaboration and tighter integration between software development and IT
FEBRUARY 2019
“ Our customers have also benefited from this transformation by receiving better quality software faster and for a lower cost” — Guru Vasudeva, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Program and Application Services, Nationwide
USA
operations, DevOps hopes to help build, test and release software faster and more reliably. “It builds on top of Lean and Agile, but it combines a significant amount of automation and brings development and infrastructure teams together,” says Vasudeva. “It requires a completely new way of thinking. We conducted a book study on Gene Kim’s DevOps Handbook so that we can really understand this methodology.” Today, the Fortune 100 company is on track to get top quartile productivity across all 200 development lines. By automating and enhancing the software development pipeline, Vasudeva adds that this proves that DevOps is “raising Nationwide’s game to a whole new level”. Yet, this journey is far from over. Keen to impart a culture of continuous learning, Nationwide founded “Teaching Thursdays” whereby the firm sets aside two hours twice per month to allow employees to teach topics in classrooms to their peers. “It’s teaching by peers for peers,” Vasudeva explains. “It’s a grassroots project: We encourage people to attend and encourage people to teach. Some of the topics include how to do test automation, w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
183
N AT I O N W I D E
184
how to use the newest version of
in making all of this journey possible,”
Angular J or sometimes it might include
Vasudeva adds. In conjunction with this,
a topic like yoga or meditation. We have
Nationwide has developed TechCon,
found this to be an incredible approach.”
its very own conference and a series of
It seems the workforce agrees. On a
code camps. “Around 2,000 of our
cumulative basis more than 10,000
associates attend TechCon, during
people participated in Teaching Thurs-
which more than 200 classes are taught.
days last year. It’s also helped to promote
It’s our own technology conference for
best practices and allowed natural
our own technology people,” he says.
leaders to shine through. “It’s been an
“We also have code camps, whereby
incredible low-cost approach, critical
we pick topics that we want to excel in
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“ IT is the manufacturing arm of any financial services and insurance company” — Guru Vasudeva, Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Program and Application Services, Nationwide
like machine learning, for instance, and
a leading employer – it has gained
invite a couple of people to study that
recognition as one of the Best Compa-
topic and to teach other members
nies to Work For by Fortune 100.
of the team. It’s helped us create a
Vasudeva is keen to point out that the
clearly defined roadmap of how our
talents of his team have been crucial
employees can go from a novice to
in making this software development
an expert in a topic. It’s helping to
strategy a reality. “It could not have
create a path to craftsmanship.”
been possible without the partnership of my peers in IT leadership,” he says.
CRUCIAL COLLABORATION
So far, Nationwide’s software-develop-
Nationwide has earned its stripes as
ment strategy has been a roaring w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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N AT I O N W I D E
success. “We can prove that we are delivering faster software at a higher quality for reduced costs,” highlights Vasudeva. “This has allowed us to transform our IT function. We’ve also replaced legacy systems with modern packages, and we can provide better mobile capabilities for our consumers and agents. It has really allowed us to enable our business goals. Our customers have also benefited from this transformation by receiving better quality 186
FEBRUARY 2019
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software faster and for a lower cost.” Nationwide has made significant strides to enhance its software development process, but the transformation is far from over. “We still have a long way to go,” notes Vasudeva. “We aren’t finished with DevOps just yet as we plan to extend DevOps practices across all 200 Nationwide software development teams. We are also experimenting with taking and applying Agile into the wider business. Then, last but not least, we’re focusing on Test Engineering and Automation (TEA). We are really making a big push to significantly automate the way we test our software.” Software engineering is undoubtedly in the throes of its own digital transformation. For businesses today, the stakes of getting this right are high, but it seems Nationwide has concocted the perfect recipe for software development transformation.
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Truliant Federal Credit Union
A MEMBER-CENTRIC DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION WRIT TEN BY
ANDRE W WOODS PRODUCED BY
ANDY TURNER 189
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TRULIANT FEDERAL CREDIT UNION
WE SPEAK TO CIO SANDEEP UTHRA ON A MEMBERCENTRIC GOAL OF DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION THAT IS ACCELERATING OPERATIONAL EXCELLENCE AND BUSINESS GROWTH
T
ruliant Federal Credit Union, a 66-yearold financial institution, has a singular and important mission: to improve the lives
of its members. According to Sandeep Uthra, Truliant’s chief information officer, the credit union 190
focuses on helping members make decisions that improve and help manage their financial lives. Unlike for-profit financial institutions, Truliant stays away from pushing products on its members. “We are a different kind of company,” he says. Truliant has 230,000 members and assets in excess of $2.3bn and provides individuals and small businesses with products, services and guidance to reach their ‘life’s goals’, including checking accounts, online and app banking, auto buying, certificates and business/financial advice, and auto and home loans. According to Uthra, Truliant’s USP is its member-centric approach. “First and foremost, we are a not-for-profit organization,” Uthra said. “That’s the biggest difference between us and other banking institutions. But, more so, our goal is to improve each of our FEBRUARY 2019
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TRULIANT FEDERAL CREDIT UNION
Hybrid IT Solutions
Colocation
Cloud
Connectivity
Managed Solutions
Professional Services
41 data center campuses. One dependable network. 888.552.FLEX
JANUARY 2019
Flexential.com
USA
193
“ OUR CEO AND PRESIDENT TRULY UNDERSTAND HOW TECHNOLOGY’S GOING TO REALLY HELP TAKE US FORWARD IN MEMBER SERVICE” — Sandeep Uthra CIO, Truliant Federal Credit Union
members’ lives, by working as trusted partner or provider of the right guidance to achieve their financial aims,” Uthra explains. “While traditional banking is more about rates and fees, all of our products and policies are consumer, not market, driven. We put people before profit. We are member-centric. We’re not just here to make money. This helps our members create financial security within their own aspirations. ”
IN THE BEGINNING Uthra joined Truliant in late 2016 as CIO. He was charged with helping shepherd the w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
TRULIANT FEDERAL CREDIT UNION
194 E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Sandeep Uthra Sandeep has over 20 years of experience developing and executing information technology (IT) strategies, including serving in executive roles in the financial services space. A native of New Delhi, India, Mr. Uthra has served in global IT leadership roles in product, consulting and financial corporations in Asia, Africa and the United States. Most notably, Mr. Uthra was Senior Vice President, Business Solutions Technology Executive at Bank of America. He leads Truliant’s Enterprise Service Delivery, Enterprise Architecture, Application Development, Systems Operations, Technology Support Services, Infrastructure Services, Information Security, and Telecommunications teams.
FEBRUARY 2019
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195 strategic direction for Truliant’s overall
logical solutions to achieve those goals.
technology landscape and to help
We really tailor our offerings as per our
drive its technology transformation.
members’ needs to provide a top-notch
“As a trusted advisor in the company,
member service.” Truliant targets
I needed to get us to a point where
locations where they are needed most
we better understood business and
and still operates a traditional guidance-
members’ needs as per our company’s
based approach. “We’re very big on
objectives.”
face-to-face interactions. We don’t
Uthra’s highly strategic role was to
want to remove the humanity in front of
help develop a roadmap that would
us. We will always keep face-to-face
achieve Truliant’s business plans by
interactions.”
leveraging technology. “As part of the Chief Planning Team, I’ve worked hard
THE HUMAN TOUCH
to understand business needs as well
While human-centric guidance is at the
as those of our members with techno-
heart of Truliant’s approach, it is adopting w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
TRULIANT FEDERAL CREDIT UNION
“ I HAVE OTHER COMPANIES LIKE MERIDIANLINK WHO SUPPORT US FROM A LENDING PLATFORM STANDPOINT AND THEN SECURITY PARTNERS SUCH AS FLEXENTIAL WHO PROVIDES HOSTING CAPABILITY” 196
— Sandeep Uthra CIO, Truliant Federal Credit Union
more technologically advanced processes to better prepare for the future of banking. “Members are changing the way they interact with financial institutions,” he explains. “I think we all know that these days people compare our sector with companies like Amazon, right? They want us to be simple and nimble – like shopping on Amazon. This demand is driving us to create a simpler, more nimble and innovative personalization for all members. The consumer experience is king.” “On the other hand, data is at the consumer’s fingertips from many external sources to compare product or services so they are well informed. It is in our best interest to know consumers’ personalized needs in a faster and agile way, to provide them with the best in-class experience. To make all this happen, we have focused on technology architecture, because speed is the new currency in financial institutions. These days, technology architecture must be simple enough to support integrated channels and with an alignment of data to understand or predict members’ needs. “Simplification and Personalization is the game here,” Uthra explains. “Financial institutions should work to simplify their technology landscape and leverage microservices or APIs (application programming
FEBRUARY 2019
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CLICK TO WATCH : USING THE TRU2GO APP 197 interfaces), to support faster and more
index of processes and technology,
nimble integration with cutting-edge
which gave Truliant a direction for
products and services.”
future investment to achieve its goal of simplification and optimization of the
DIGITAL ECOSYSTEMS
members’ journeys/interactions. “Our
When Uthra joined Truliant Federal
vision is to enable consumers of our
Credit Union, he hired an enterprise
technology with a simple, faster and
architect to help build out business
personalized experience. “Our CEO
technology ecosystems to understand
and President truly understand how
dynamics around business units,
technology’s going to really help take
functions, processes and underlying
us forward in the personalized member
technology. He then sat with internal
service.
teams and critical partners to identify
“We know that it’s important to adapt
friction between those ecosystem
and evolve quickly in line with the
constructs. This resulted in a maturity
fast-paced changes in today’s financial w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
TRULIANT FEDERAL CREDIT UNION
services landscape. Our goal is to create an impactful, best-in-class digital journey that is both dynamic and personal, and maintains an authentic human connection,” says Truliant President Todd Hall. The other important factor in Truliant’s technology transformation is partnership with fintechs and product companies for technology transformation. “Our strategic partners support us to achieve our vision. Companies like Fiserv who support our core banking platform perspective. MeridianLink provides lending capabilities and 198
Flexential provides hosting capability. Veristor enables us with virtualized environment, to aid better manageability and performance and security of infrastructure – because it’s not just about spending or investing in infra-
the near future: simpler, faster and
structure, it’s more about how to optimize
personalization. If I’m a member, and
that in terms of performance and security.
I need a home, normally I would reach
Palo Alto Network really helped us to
out to a realtor or a mortgage or lending
safeguard our technology and infra-
company. We reach out to the builder
structure and Secureworks provides
and to many other folks to achieve that
information security capabilities.”
goal for our family. But an ecosystem approach asks: ‘Why can’t we bring all
FUTURE TRENDS
these kinds of players into same
For Uthra, the future of the industry lies
ecosystem and make it happen? So, as
in ecosystem-driven personalization.
a customer or a member, I will just reach
“I see these three things happening in
out to a bank or financial institution like
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34 Number of
office locations
$2.3bn Approximate value of assets
1952
Year founded
Truliant and say, ‘I need a home.’”
really fortunate to feel that I’m part of
Uthra also sees increasing leverage
this high technology team that brings
of APIs for greater integration in sector
those kinds of innovations together.”
technology with many third-party or indirect product companies. I see artificial intelligence and data playing a big role. Data is going to provide integration value because it will predict and say what our customers or members are asking and at what point in time. “I take pride in leading this vision because of our people and culture. I’m w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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Wipro: Fostering open innovation in financial services WRIT TEN BY
BEN MOUNCER PRODUCED BY
TOM VENTURO
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Mahesh Raja, Vice President, Financial Services — Americas, Wipro Limited, outlines the technology powerhouse’s plan to develop a futureproof ecosystem for the financial sector
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dapting long-held business models to the irrepressible forces of change is, right now, the critical challenge facing our most
prestigious financial institutions. Never before has the established order had to contend with such genuine threats to its dominance. While undoubt202
edly a priority for leaders across industries, the next stage of evolution for the financial sector is especially unpredictable as a system, impenetrable for so long, opens up slowly to different methods, ideas and thinking. Technology has been the catalyst for that change. Decision-makers have no choice but to find answers to questions such as ‘how can we use advanced AI and machine learning to predict the future?’, ‘should we move our entire systems to the cloud?’ and ‘what is in place to shield our information from cyberattacks?’. Implementing transformative tools within business structures that have grown over decades is a slow process, however – and this is why start-ups, challengers and fin-tech, free from historical baggage and practices, have been able to steal a march on their once-uncatchable rivals. FEBRUARY 2019
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CLICK TO WATCH : ‘WIPRO-MAHESH RAJA, VICE PRESIDENT, FINANCIAL SERVICES, AMERICAS, WIPRO (INFOGRAPHIC)’ 203 Mahesh Raja, Vice President, Financial Services, Americas, Wipro Limited is leading a small group aiming to bridge the gap between the United States’ most recognized entities and the disruptive outsiders offering alternatives to the status quo. He believes that, through the development of Wipro’s ‘New-Age Financial Services’ ecosystem, the building blocks are in place to forge the industry’s future.
WIPRO’S FOOTPRINT IN FINANCIAL SERVICES Wipro is one of the foremost technology service providers the world over. w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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A significant influence with fingerprints on just about every industry, it is a global leader in the fields of IT, consultancy and the changing of business processes through the use of advanced and emerging technologies. The company generates approximately $8bn of revenue annually, with 30% of this figure earned in the financial services sector, encompassing not only the banking world but also insurance and capital markets. Wipro’s Americas region – covering the United States, Canada and Latin
“ The traditional banks and financial institutions are getting disrupted by new-age platform companies, whether they like it or not” — Mahesh Raja, Vice President, Financial Services, Americas, Wipro Limited 205
America – is its core market for financial services, bringing in a significant portion on its own each year. Specializing in E X E C U T I V E P R OF IL E
Mahesh Raja Mahesh is Wipro Limited’s Banking & FS industry leader supporting top-tier full service banks, large payment/fintech clients across US, Canada and LATAM with P&L responsibility. He also leads Wipro’s Digital, fintech/ New Age ecosystem which includes developing partnerships with leading fintech players, helping clients assess the fintech ecosystem and potential implications to their business, and bringing solutions to clients through alliances and implementation.
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HE W L E T T PA C K A R D E N T E R P R IS E — W IP R O S N A P S HO T
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At Wipro, strategic partnerships are one of the core pillars of our business strategy. Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) and Wipro have been working together for 20+ years, delivering the best in class solutions around hybrid IT, data center consolidation, legacy system modernization, and software-defined DC. Wipro’s BoundaryLess DataCenter™ (BLDC) framework, integrated with HPE’s Hybrid IT solutions, offers Cloud services that are responsive to dynamic workloads, drive outcome based financial management and enable agility and scale. These services are integrated and delivered through Wipro ServiceNXT™, our managed services framework. Today, the two companies are capitalizing on their progressive, forward-looking view of technology to help provide new age business solutions across blockchain, edge computing, cognitive and more. Wipro and HPE are creating blockchain solutions for our banking customers. HPE’s Mission Critical Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT) enables customers to run distributed ledger blockchain workloads that dem-and 100% fault tolerance at mission critical levels and ensures massive scalability to grow with the business. Wipro is leveraging HPE Aruba’s Software Defined Branch solution to enhance visibility, cloud agility, control and policy enforcement by integrating operations, security and management of wireless, wired and the WAN, all from a single pane of glass. We are helping banks redefine Desktop Virtualization and deliver the new age comprehensive virtual work place through Wipro Virtua-Desk™. The solution enhances application performance and provides f lexibility to the customers in choosing an on-premise or hosted-appliance solution based on HPE’s hyper converged platform.
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digital transformation, customer experience, application engineering
opposite ends of the spectrum. “We started this group within Wipro
and infrastructure and business
after asking ourselves this: what if our
operation services, Wipro’s Americas
existing clients, where we have made
region engages numerous high-profile
a significant chunk of our revenue, don’t
clients, including some of the largest
exist in 10-15 years’ time – what is going
banks in the US.
to happen to them?” he explains. “The
Firmly established within that sphere,
traditional banks and financial institu-
Mahesh’s ‘New-Age Financial Services’
tions are getting disrupted by new-age
initiative represents something more
platform companies, whether they like
adventurous as it looks to encourage
it or not.
collaboration between players at the
“Builders of innovation, both on the w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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“ While these start-ups might be small and may not even meet our threshold of being a client today, in a few years they will be the next unicorns” — Mahesh Raja, Vice President, Financial Services, Americas, Wipro Limited
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business model side and the operations side, are driven by innovative technologies and some of our incumbent clients need to adapt to these tech-driven changes. “Embracing innovation from the outside – from start-ups and fintech – is essential for them and for companies like us. While these start-ups might be small and may not even meet our threshold of being a client today, in a few years they will be the next unicorns. “That’s the broad genesis of what we thought about when we set up the new ecosystem. Wipro’s part in that is to build a strategic partnership between the established companies and the start-ups. We understand the industry domain; we focus on technology and can enable organizations as small as a fintech to scale up, leveraging our relationship with the larger financial institutions.”
A NEW-AGE ECOSYSTEM The importance of Mahesh’s project to Wipro’s future vision can be reflected in the fact that, two years ago, he was given his remit from the very top. Working under the guidance of the company’s Chief Executive Officer & Executive Director – Abidali Z. Neemuchwala, and with strategic direction from President & Global Head, BFSI – Shaji Farooq, he has built a cluster team made up of key personnel based in Silicon Valley, w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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WIPRO
$8bn+ Revenue
1945 Year of incorporation + 175,000 Number of employees 210
New York, Bangalore and London. ‘New-Age Financial Services’ encour-
Wipro is able to provide the balance in momentum between a larger organiza-
ages a two-way street of collaboration
tion’s execution and the impetus of a
between client and start-up, with the
start-up through an agile ‘right model’
end goal of improving operations for
delivery process.
both parties. For the client, welcoming
“A start-up operates at a very high
a start-up’s ideas is a way of accelerat-
velocity but a client organization operates
ing its own innovation, keeping it ahead
not even close to that, so the question
of the competition. For the smaller firm,
is how we bridge that gap,” he says.
a relationship opens doors to resourc-
“Firstly, Wipro comes in. Then we help
es, customers and funding.
these fintechs or start-ups find the
By creating what Mahesh refers to as a ‘360-degree’ partnership eco-system, FEBRUARY 2019
right stakeholders to navigate large organizational complexities.”
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“For example, if they have a unique
into this process, this is actually how we
asset in any business process area,
help you with your time-to-market. If you
how do you take an asset or platform
build it, it will probably take four years. If
to a larger organization? And how do
we can partner in this new-age ecosys-
you identify those stakeholders who’ll
tem, we can actually do it in four months.”
be interested in assimilating that into the larger organizations?” “Thirdly, we assist our clients in their
Embracing outside innovation is now becoming a vital strategic approach for the most successful companies as
transformation journey more holistically.
they seek out external partners for
For example, we don’t just look at one
sourcing ideas, commercialization and
business process – we look at everything
expansion into adjacent businesses and
from an end-to-end perspective and say,
new segments. According to Mahesh,
look, if you’re reimagining your model
‘entire corporate strategies are w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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“ We are able to constantly assess and understand the implication and complexities that result from running real world businesses. This helps startups adapt their solutions to these needs” 212
— Mahesh Raja, Vice President, Financial Services, Americas, Wipro Limited
predicated on a networked model’ – but it’s a model that doesn’t come without obstacles.
CHALLENGES WITH COLLABORATION For Mahesh, the most common issue to contend with is what has become referred to as ‘Not Invented Here Syndrome’, or ‘NIHS’. Larger organizations often harbour cultures steeped in NIHS, instinctively reacting negatively to ideas and concepts from an external source. “This syndrome is pretty common in many FEBRUARY 2019
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large enterprises,” he notes. “This is where Wipro comes in and says, ‘Hey, let us help you embrace some of these outside innovations and bring it in house for you to see if it works’.” Secondly, Mahesh believes start-ups are often too narrow in their focus when compared with the broad digital transformation agendas set by the CEOs and other C-level executives of larger organizations. Additionally, he observes that smaller operations tend to lack the deep domain knowledge in areas of compliance and legality while also falling short in the resource to focus on long-term solution viability.
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“These barriers affect the success of the collaboration between established companies and start-ups,” he adds. “Start-ups also find it difficult to navigate the vast corporate structures and processes of the established companies to reach the right audience for the solutions they have. “For lack of a better term, Wipro is trying to be a partner that helps bring these fears into the same ecosystem by trying the ‘balance’ option. We have deep experience in working with complex organizational structures and satisfying the stringent requirement of these functions.” “We also have a lot of domain and functional experience and expertise that has been built w w w. f i n t e c h m a g a z i n e . c o m
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over a long period of association with our clients. We are able to constantly assess and understand the implication and complexities that result from running real world businesses. This helps start-ups adapt their solutions to these needs.�
AN OPEN INNOVATION PATHWAY Wipro has evaluated more than 1,200+ new-age businesses as part of the project, but with current manpower it has elected to focus on a handful of 214
promising assets in the fields of business model innovations, cognitive artificial intelligence and machinelearning; technologies that have proven the most disruptive for its major clients. Wipro has partnered with three companies in that specific space (AI/ Cognitive), each of which has developed a unique business model and platform with the potential to transform processes across the sector. Additionally, it is working with challenger banks in North America, Europe and Latin America, on top of a major project with a large bank with operations across two continents. FEBRUARY 2019
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With a dearth of competition in this area, Wipro believes it has a serious opportunity to broaden its horizons and exist at the centre of a new era of open innovation in financial services. “The way we are looking at the newage ecosystem is not that it’s going to make the next $100mn or $500mn for us but that we are starting to work with those companies, which we have never worked with in the past,” concludes Mahesh. “From our perspective, we have to start operating and thinking like these new-age companies because the way we need to service them is very different. They’re really nimble, really agile and very rapid.” “I think it’s a significant differentiator for us as a company and we believe this will be a wedge into the marketplace, especially with some of the propositions we are having with our current customers. It is a real opportunity for Wipro.”
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