Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – Bank Muamalat Malaysia Berhad (Bank Muamalat) has formed an extensive partnership with Backbase, a global engagement banking platform, as part of its strategic plan to become a next-generation digital Islamic bank for all. This collaboration, together with Mambu’s core banking transformation, represents a key milestone in Bank Muamalat’s efforts to reinvent its digital Islamic banking solutions. 

Innovating towards a unified Islamic digital banking experience by bridging silos and traditional banking processes, Bank Muamalat uses platform technology to achieve their aim of creating an outstanding customer-centric experience. With the Backbase Engagement Banking Platform acting as the main platform, Bank Muamalat can design distinctive and personalised customer journeys that are secure, consistent, scalable, and enable end-to-end processes like onboarding, financing, transactions, and backend consumer servicing and engagement. 

A digital Islamic banking super app that aims to improve the bank’s retail banking offerings is essential to its digital transformation. This significant change gives the bank the flexibility and control to carry out its long-term vision while enabling it to provide customised banking experiences catered to each individual customer’s preferences.

In addition to standard banking services, the aim is to provide integrated life empowerment elements that cover financial and faith-based components, as well as the guarantee of security and peace of mind in every transaction, in order to meet the needs of Malaysia’s broad consumer base. In the near future, Bank Muamalat also hopes to incorporate similar advances into its SME and commercial banking sectors.

The technical developments that are occurring are a result of Bank Muamalat’s dedication to innovation and constant improvement in all of its offerings, including services, products, and client experiences. The eight strategic thrusts that constitute the foundation of this change are: increasing customer centricity; facilitating Islamic banking for all; and accelerating business growth. These priorities highlight the bank’s goal of exceeding the ever-expanding requirements and expectations of its growing clientele.

Mambu for digital core capabilities and Backbase for modernization and customer-centric Engagement Banking are integrated into Bank Muamalat’s comprehensive cloud-based transformation. The bank’s financial services and product offers are improved by switching to a cloud-based model, which also saves a lot of money and increases operational effectiveness. Furthermore, by leveraging Mambu’s digital core to meet regulatory standards and fortify its security controls—both of which are critical for a financial institution—it helps Bank Muamalat’s developers to expedite software development cycles.

Mambu takes on a crucial role as one of Backbase’s most important core partners. The integration of Mambu’s core banking platform with Backbase’s engagement banking solutions creates a basis for banks of all sizes to break free from isolated, antiquated cores and go through a comprehensive digital revolution. 

Backbase and Mambu’s collaboration offer an efficient and resilient shift to contemporary banking protocols by providing a comprehensive, end-to-end, cloud-native digital banking solution built on an open architecture. Banks are better equipped to address the changing demands of the modern, tech-savvy customer and the larger banking environment with this unified offering. 

Speaking about the partnership, Khairul Kamarudin, president & chief executive officer of Bank Muamalat, said, “We are attentive to the current needs of our diverse consumer base and are dedicated to advancing financial inclusion and Islamic banking practices to be more modern, customer-centric, and digitally progressive. The strategic advantage of the Backbase Engagement Banking Platform lies in its ability to ‘adopt and build’, which aligns with our goal to launch the digital Islamic banking platform by the end of the year.” 

Meanwhile, Riddhi Dutta, regional vice president of Asia at Backbase, stated, “Islamic banks, especially in Asia, are keen to enhance their digital banking solutions to stay competitive. At Backbase, we’ve had the privilege of collaborating with Islamic banks across the globe, gaining invaluable insights into their unique needs and challenges. Our Engagement Banking Platform is designed with flexibility at its core, offering pre-built journeys and microservices that can be customized to meet the unique requirements of Islamic banking.” 

He added, “Our partnership with Bank Muamalat exemplifies our commitment to support Islamic banks in their digital transformation endeavors. Additionally, we hold a deep appreciation for Malaysia’s vibrant Islamic banking culture and dynamics, which stand as a beacon of innovation and growth in the global Islamic finance sector.” 

Lastly, Perminder Grewal Dallow, director of solutions engineering at Mambu, remarked, “Mambu is a key player in the cloud-native core banking space, today powering financial institutions across 65 countries. As one of the first traditional banks in Southeast Asia to embrace our cloud banking platform, we look forward to enabling Bank Muamalat to build innovative products and services, streamline IT processes, and craft exceptional customer journeys.” 

“The endorsement from Bank Negara Malaysia, the regulatory body for Malaysia’s financial sector, to advance this project underscores the trust and assurance in both Mambu and Backbase. We look forward to a strong partnership with Bank Muamalat as it modernises its technology foundation,” Dallow added. 

Singapore – Adoption and usage of digital banking and payment channels showed an encouraging trajectory among ASEAN consumers based on the latest study conducted by UOB.

The latest study revealed that 55% of respondents had increased usage of their mobile banking app over the past year, with Internet banking via a web browser coming in second at 35%. This shows that ASEAN consumers are increasingly banking on their mobiles to serve their financial needs. 

The study also shows that ASEAN consumers are now more receptive to technologies like consolidated platforms for their financial data. The consolidated financial data platforms clocked a 20% increase in usage region-wide, with Thailand and Vietnam having the most enthusiastic adopters across the region. 

Another notable piece of data worth pointing out is that bank branches saw a 17% rise in usage region-wide, indicating that consumers still valued face-to-face interaction as a complement to the multitude of digital channels available. More than half of Singaporeans prefer to use digital platforms for simple services such as applying for credit and debit cards but still prefer offline or a combination of channels for complex, high-value transactions. 

In the payments space, ASEAN consumers have shown themselves to be savvy adopters of the latest technologies. E-wallets and QR code-based payments topped regional payment modes, with 56% of respondents using them in the past year. E-commerce payment platforms come in second at 49%, and mobile wallet credit or debit cards come in third at 48%. However, the latter is the payment mode that consumers are most interested in trying out, with 22% expressing a desire to do so in the next year.

In Singapore, physical credit and debit cards topped the preferred payment mode list at 62%, showing that consumers still preferred to pay via bank platforms rather than third-party ones. Mobile wallet credit and debit cards and peer-to-peer payment services both ranked second at 50%.

The latest study also found that a significant majority of ASEAN consumers are open to sharing their financial data with banks and are in favour of their information being used to curate products and services personalised to their needs and wants.

Over 70% of respondents find it comfortable sharing financial data to be consolidated by banks on one platform, with 83% preferring to do so via banking apps versus other app service providers like e-commerce or shopping apps and multi-service apps.

Furthermore, of these respondents, more than 90% expressed a preference for receiving personalised product and service offerings in their banking apps. The strong demand for personalisation is also consistent across all age groups, income levels, and genders surveyed.

Jacquelyn Tan, head of group personal financial services at UOB, said, “We are happy to see that the enthusiasm for the push for digitalisation and receptiveness to the new tech era is not losing steam. As a barometer of regional sentiment towards the economy as well as pertinent areas of interest such as spending and financial behaviour and technology, the findings from UOB ACSS 2023 offer valuable insights for consumers and businesses, to adapt and poise themselves to navigate the current uncertain economic environment.” 

She added, “As a financial institution, the trends and insights highlighted by the study relating to consumers’ key concerns, savings, financial, and digital behaviour and preferences will help us better understand our customers across the region. This allows us to cater to their needs and strengthen our engagement efforts, to support our customers in adapting to the new banking and digital landscape and capturing opportunities in the current economic environment to advance towards their financial ambitions.”

Singapore – UOB has recently launched its UOB SME app, an all-in-one digital banking platform that aims to meet the financial needs and business requirements of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

The UOB SME app offers SMEs a suite of solutions that address financing and other business needs, both on desktop and via the mobile app. Through the platform, SME customers will also be able to view their cash flow data with an interactive dashboard, apply for loans, and set personalised foreign currency watchlists with instant alerts. Furthermore, users will be able to access customised insights as well as find events relevant to their industries.

UOB SME’s features have been developed based on the insights from the ‘ASEAN SME Transformation Study 2022’ by UOB, Accenture, and Dun & Bradstreet. The study showed that 66 per cent of SMEs are keen to invest more in technology, especially in the areas of digital marketing, customer management, sales, network management and operational processes. With the app, SMEs will be able to access digital solutions, such as accounting and invoicing, human resources and e-commerce, seamlessly. They will be able to automate and streamline their processes to increase productivity and efficiency.

Lawrence Loh, head of group business banking at UOB, said, “The launch of the UOB SME app marks a new self-service digital banking experience for SMEs. Building off customer insights, it is designed to combine banking solutions, analytics, and business insights in a single platform. It will provide SMEs greater convenience, a real-time view, and better financial control. SMEs can now stay on top of their business, and focus on their strategies for growth.”

UOB said the launch of UOB SME is part of its continual efforts to help businesses transform digitally. The Bank launched UOB Infinity in 2020 to help larger corporate clients with their digital banking needs. The UOB SME app shares the same banking and transactional capabilities as UOB Infinity, but also provides features that are tailored to SMEs’ different needs such as the business management solutions and interactive dashboard.

Manila, Philippines — The Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) recently sealed a pioneering partnership with Alipay+, a suite of global cross-border mobile payments and marketing solutions operated by Ant Group, to enable digital banking customers to shop globally. This makes BPI the first bank partnering with Alipay+ as a mobile payment provider to extend its payments service beyond local merchants.

Through this collaboration, BPI is now available as a payment option at regional and global online merchants supported by Alipay+, while users of BPI can make payments in these merchants with their preferred and familiar payment method.

Noel Santiago, chief digital officer of BPI, said, “We aim to better serve and engage the now digitally savvy customers, by continuously innovating and expanding our digital ecosystem of partners and merchants, for an enhanced digital experience that goes beyond banking.”

Santiago adds, “With the use of BPI Online credentials, the partnership with Alipay+ will bring a convenient and seamless payment experience to BPI customers and connect them to regional and global brands.”

According to BPI, their consistent push to adopt new technologies, 91% of their transactions is now digital, up from 85% prior to the pandemic. Their digital customer base has also grown to 4.9 million in 2021 with a 20% increase in active users compared to the previous year.

With innovative technologies and products, Alipay+ has seen strong adoption since its launch in 2020 among regional and global online merchants across e-commerce, digital entertainment and O2O. More than 1 million offline merchants in major European and Asian markets have also partnered with Alipay+ since.

CHENG Guoming, GM of Alipay+ global payment partnership of Ant Group, said, “Digital payment is not only about mobile wallets, but also includes banking apps and other digitalized payment methods. Alipay+ is working closely with digital payment providers such as BPI to alleviate cross-border payment pain points for consumers. BPI is one of the largest and most trusted banks in the Philippines with a loyal customer base. We are excited to partner with BPI to make regional and global brands more accessible to local consumers and to enhance their lifestyle.”

Jakarta, Indonesia – PT FinAccel Teknologi Indonesia, a directly controlled subsidiary of FinAccel Pte Ltd, the parent company of Kredivo has announced that it has acquired a majority share in PT Bank Bisnis Internasional, Tbk. The acquisition is seen as a big step forward in FinAccel’s expansion strategy of providing customers with a wide range of financial services. 

Said services range from digital credit and BNPL, to digital banking and larger-ticket loans in the future. PT FinAccel Teknologi Indonesia will hold 75 per cent of Bank Bisnis at the end of the acquisition process, which is expected to be completed by the end of this week, with the Suriadi family, the former majority owners, keeping a significant minority interest. All regulatory permissions, including from Indonesia’s Financial Services Authority, have been obtained for this acquisition.

Akshay Garg, group CEO & co-founder of FinAccel, said that Kredivo has been at the forefront of consumer credit digitization via its BNPL business over the last several years and that the digitization of Indonesian banking services is only getting started. 

“In line with the mission to serve customers with products that are fast, affordable and widely accessible, they look forward to serving customers with world-class banking products in the future. They are also very grateful to the Suriadi family for their support and cooperation during this year-long acquisition process,” said Garg.

Purnawan Suriadi, lead shareholder representative for the Suriadis, commented, “Bank Bisnis has a long and proud heritage. As the banking sector rapidly digitizes, they are very excited to bring in FinAccel Teknologi as the new majority shareholder of the bank, and look forward to working with them in their vision of building the leading digital bank franchise in Indonesia.”

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia – In a bid to support the leap of the Malaysian banking industry to go digital, global management consulting firm Oliver Wyman and Technology and software engineering company GFT have teamed up to support Al Rajhi Bank Malaysia’s (ARBM) desire to design, build and launch a cloud-based digital bank.

To set new standards of excellence for Islamic banking in Malaysia, ARBM will undertake a complete digital redesign of their products, services, and channels for this new digital bank

Arsalaan Ahmed, chief executive officer at ARBM, said that they have invested significantly in innovation as they lay the foundation of a customer-focused digital bank which offers best-in-class digital banking propositions and channels to benefit individual and business customers.

“We are tapping into the vast potential of innovation and partnering with key experts to provide added value to our customers and better serve the Malaysian market, and ARBM is seizing the opportunities in both digital banking and Islamic finance by striving to become the number one Islamic finance innovation bank in Malaysia,” Ahmed said.

Meanwhile, Dan Jones, partner at Oliver Wyman Digital, said, “The architecture and technology stack we’ve recommended will allow ARBM to provide disruptive, mobile-first, and highly scalable banking services.”

Lastly, Chris Ortiz, global markets and region manager for APAC and UK at GFT, commented, “GFT supports the design, build and launch of ARBM’s digital bank. This new digital bank will enable ARBM to respond to its clients’ needs for simpler, faster and better banking.”

Manila, Philippines – Tinkoff, the global online financial ecosystem centred around the needs of customers, has extended its partnership with integrated digital ecosystem provider BPC, to leverage the firm’s SaaS Cloud payment services for its planned expansion to the Philippines.

The project is an extension of an existing partnership between the two companies. This is a testimony to BPC’s proven technical expertise in digital banking and payments, as well as its extensive local knowledge and experience in the Philippines and across Asia.

The new agreement entails that BPC’s next-generation payment processing company, Radar Payments, will be managing the end-to-end payment experience for prospective Tinkoff customers in the country. This includes virtual and physical card production, as well as debit, credit card issuance and management, SmartVista ACS for 3DS secure services, and fraud prevention.

Moreover, BPC will be supporting Tinkoff in cloud SaaS payment adoption in the Philippines, a trend that has emerged globally for many reasons, including greater flexibility in accessing banking services, and cost savings and security.

Tinkoff said that it also chose BPC for its capability to support its ambitious growth both in terms of customers and expected transaction volume.

George Chesakov, Tinkoff’s international expansion lead, believes that their technology and experience will help them build the right products, boosting financial inclusion in the Philippines. 

“With BPC’s payment processing business, we have a partner with whom we have a long-standing relationship and who aligns with our SaaS Cloud vision. Moreover, we value BPC’s strong local knowledge of the Philippines’ banking sector, which should help us start operating in this market faster,” said Chesakov.

Meanwhile, Evgenia Loginova, the CEO at Radar Payments by BPC, shared that they could not be any prouder to continue their journey serving Tinkoff and its future customers in Asia. 

“Success depends on the speed of deployment of new services in the digital banking industry, especially in the Philippines market, which will welcome a number of new market players in 2022,” said Loginova.

Singapore – The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the Association of Banks in Singapore (ABS) have announced new measures to encourage financial institutions in Singapore to enhance their own security across their digital banking systems.

A main takeaway from this announcement is that MAS and ABS has ordered banks to remove any clickable links in emails or SMSes sent to their retail customers. Other measures being announced include delay of at least 12 hours before activation of a new soft token on a mobile device and sending out a notification to existing mobile number or email registered with the bank whenever there is a request to change a customer’s mobile number or email address.

The announcement also included reminders for putting up a threshold for funds transfer transaction notifications to customers to be set by default at SG$100 or lower, as well as cooling-off period before implementation of requests for key account changes such as in a customer’s key contact details.

MAS and ABS continue to warn the general public to never click on links provided in SMSes or emails or never divulge internet banking credentials or passwords to anyone, as well as verifying SMSes or emails received by calling the bank directly and verify that one is at the bank’s official website before making any transactions.

Wee Ee Cheong, Chairman of The Association of Banks in Singapore said, “As an industry, we have always focused on the need to ensure robust security measures while meeting customers’ expectations for convenient and swift services. Together with the MAS and ecosystem players, the banking industry will continue to strengthen consumer protection measures. We also ask that the public stay vigilant given that scams continue to evolve and are executed quickly. We remain committed to upholding the confidence with which customers can transact online safely, while still maintaining a high level of service.”

Meanwhile, Ravi Menon, managing director at MAS, commented, “MAS is deeply concerned about the recent spate of scams and the financial losses suffered by victims. The threat of scams will not go away, but we can reduce our vulnerabilities. This requires a multi-pronged response across the ecosystem. MAS, together with the police, IMDA and other relevant government agencies, is working closely with the financial industry, the telco industry, consumer groups, and other stakeholders to strengthen our collective resilience against scam attacks. We will ensure that digital banking remains secure, efficient, and trusted.”

Hong Kong – As the line between reality and the virtual world is disappearing in favor of the metaverse setup, Hong Kong-based bank Hang Seng Bank has introduced its new key opinion leader: meet Hazel, a virtual spokesperson for the bank’s digital banking brand.

True to Hazel’s mantra of ‘It’s our world now!’ to communicate a virtually-integrated lifestyle, Hang Seng Bank aims to showcase with their latest virtual persona on how technology and innovation have released many of life’s constraints, making it possible for people to do more and achieve more.

Hazel first debuted on Instagram during Christmas 2021, where she shared visions of a young and active lifestyle that slash marks fashion, sports and other creative arenas. She even released a collaboration with Hong Kong-Canadian singer-songwriter Jay Fung.

Her first appearance in Hang Seng Bank’s promotional video was released this month, where it focuses on discovering the new era of digital banking and feeling empowered to achieve #AllOfTheAbove—an ideal lifestyle with unlimited possibilities.

Lucia Ku, head of customer propositions and customer management at Hang Seng Bank, and the one who spearheaded this virtual persona launch, said, “We want Hazel to embody young ideals. When we set out to develop Hazel, we surveyed nearly 750 young people between the ages of 18 and 30 to deepen our understanding of their preferences and attitudes to life. We then injected the essence of our findings into the personality of the character created.

According to the campaign, Hazel is a 25-year-old teen with diversified interests and skills. She is at once an illustrator, a model and a dreamer. She seizes every opportunity to play to her strengths and try new things. She is also a fashion trendsetter who is passionate about music, art and sports, particularly yoga. Hazel’s life philosophy echoes that of many young people: she aspires to be independent, impatient to lead a life full of excitement, is able to explore at will, try new ideas and experiences, and always ready to take on new opportunities.

In addition, Hazel’s digital-savvy, slasher-focused approach to life reflects Hang Seng’s deep understanding of customers’ changing attitudes and needs. It is emphatically focused on innovation and advancement to provide seamless online/offline, omni-channel future-proof banking services that empower its customers to, like Hazel, choose #AllOfTheAbove.

Hanoi, Vietnam – The Southeast Asia Commercial Joint Stock Bank, also known as SeABank, has tapped cloud services provider Google Cloud to enhance the service quality and customer experiences delivered on its SeAMobile/SeANet digital banking platform. 

Through Google Cloud’s enterprise-grade technologies, SeABank can optimize costs, strengthen security and accelerate innovation. In addition, SeABank will use Google Cloud’s secure, flexible and scalable infrastructure solutions, such as Migrate for Compute Engine and Google Kubernetes Engine, to migrate critical workloads from its on-premises data center to the cloud and build and deploy cloud-native applications. 

More importantly, SeABank will lean on Google Cloud’s capabilities in AI, machine learning and data analytics to acquire better understanding of its customers and create valuable new services to meet their future needs.

Le Thu Thuy, general director at SeABank, said, “The cooperation with Google Cloud is one of the crucial steps taken by SeABank to leverage industry-leading infrastructure and AI capabilities at speed and scale, to optimize our capacity to deploy customer-centric products and services, and enhance the overall digital and mobile banking experience.”

Having integrated AI into digital banking services on SeAMobile, as well as across its IT systems for customer service, operations, financial management and risk management, the core pillars of SeABank’s digital transformation strategy for the next five years will include end-to-end digitalization and providing hyper personalized customer experiences.

Meanwhile, Ruma Balasubramanian, managing director for Southeast Asia at Google Cloud, commented, “SeABank’s choice of Google Cloud as its primary cloud provider reinforces the Bank’s commitment toward using technology to advance how it interacts with and serves its customers – from anywhere and at any time. The bank can now amplify its abilities to build new capabilities and services, quickly deliver a predictive customer experience, and leapfrog into becoming the bank of the future.”