CWG, Infosys Pledge to Support Banks on Digital Banking

Computer Warehouse Group Plc (CWG) and Infosys Finacle have pledged to support Nigerian banks in their efforts to provide digital banking in the country.

Venkatramana Gosavi, Senior vice president and head, growth market, Infosys Finacle, made the pledge at Digital Banking Nigeria 2017 forum held in Lagos.

According to him, ‘digital is one of the big themes and there is a lot of interests and we are using this opportunity to interact with our clients and inform them on what our views are on being fully digitalized worldwide and what opportunities are available to them in terms of service to their customers; whether is it improving customer loyalty, process efficiency and other factors which are topics we covered today.’

“For a bank to be fully digital implies the customer is at the centre of the business. With this, you will be able to measure the kind of transactions the client will be interested in. Why is it that some of the clients were able to stick to us and others sometimes shift from bank to another?”

“Digital banking is more of a journey; it is about something that can be brought to the market as fast as possible through a FinTech company. So, in essence it is not just as about modern infrastructure in banks but how we leverage these infrastructures. All the investments banks have made and the framework, we are talking about how to leverage the whole mantra of services,” he said.

James Agada, chief executive officer, CWG, explained: “the fact that you have issues with infrastructure is also a point for innovation. If you remember, Nigeria is the only country in the world to implement payment cards offline. You had cards but you had no network, but now you could still use the card. It was innovation driven. The same way, as you are going digital there are a lot of issues coming up; both skills and infrastructure.”

Austin Okere, vice chairman, CWG stated: “Some people are worried about will the banks ever become digital banks. We were worried before, whether PoS will ever take off in Nigeria, we surmounted that. We also got worried whether ‘cashless’. We have taken some steps back. But before now, you could travel anywhere with any Nigerian card; you don’t need the foreign cards. Today, because of lack of forex we are not able to do that. These were impossible. I think the banks are best suited based on the investments they have made to lead that collaboration. And they just have to adapt and change; the best way to do that is such that some are brining technology people and teaching them banking.”

“They will infuse technology and millennial thinking into banking. One of the predictions is that half of the industry will be driven by the millennial by 2015. Therefore, we have to look at how they consume. Millennial are not going to write cheques; they are not going into the banking hall. So, if you do not address the consumer-pattern of the millennial you will be ruining your business. We can work with the banks to chat a timetable which will depict where we are, where we need to be and what we need to do to get there and how long it will take us to get there.”