Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

At a Glance

● 4 months to implement Temenos core banking platform

● 50-70% faster timeframes for new product launches

● 6 months to launch new online mortgage products

Next Bank is a native digital challenger bank headquartered in Taipei, serving retail customers. It launched in January 2022 and is one of only three banks in recent years to have obtained a digital banking license in Taiwan. It is committed to creating banking services that customers may never have imagined with innovative thinking, design aesthetics, and friendly experiences. Its main shareholder is not from a traditional banking background, but instead is Taiwan’s largest telecommunications company – Chunghwa Telecom. That goes some way to explain its challenger mentality.

The speed with which Next Bank has captured market attention will encourage Taiwan’s older banks to innovate, predicts Eric Lee, its Chief Information Officer. “Many banks in Taiwan have been established for a long time and are relatively rigid. For them, transformation is a heavy burden.” He offers mortgages as an example of the lack of innovation in the sector. “In the traditional housing loan experience, customers need to go into a bank branch to complete their application. With Next Bank, customers can do everything on their mobile. I think this is a pioneering work.”

Rapid launch

This new online mortgage offer was built and launched in just six months, using the Temenos core banking platform. “Our entire mortgage business, from project approval to overall launch, took only six months,” explains Eric. “That speed is a huge competitive advantage, and will become more so as we launch new products into market.” That short timeframe is largely down to the rapid deployment of the Temenos core banking platform, which took just four months. “We were so impressed by the quick and smooth implementation of the Temenos core banking platform. It meant we could get to work earlier on building our mortgage offer,” adds Eric.

Eric highlights that the speed with which Next Bank launched its new mortgage service has created a stir in the sector. Shortly after the launch, Taiwan Bank, the nation’s largest bank, sent one of their top designers to Next to exchange lessons on how to create a 100% online mortgage product.

This was a great endorsement of the approach and progress that Next Bank has made is such a short period of time, and illustrates how the Temenos core banking platforms is front of mind for any bank when it comes to creating new digital services.”

Eric Lee, Chief Information Officer at Next Bank

Configurability the key

Mortgages are just one service in Next Bank’s new product portfolio, alongside accounts, loans, and insurance. It has all been built and runs on the Temenos core banking platform. Key to the choice of Temenos was the configurability of the platform, explains Eric. “Like every country, Taiwan has specific regulations that differ from other countries. Off-the-shelf solutions would have been very painful for us to customize and integrate. With Temenos this capability is built-in, so launching a new product is much faster.” As an example, the six months it took to launch its online mortgage product represents a 50-70% reduction in the typical timeframes for these projects.

Next Bank will be making the most of this capability. Its next product offers—corporate management and wealth management—are expected to launch very soon, with foreign exchange planned for Q1 2024.

More capabilities under one roof

The breadth of integrated capabilities included on the Temenos core banking platform has made it easier and faster for Next Bank to quickly secure a market presence.

Not yet two years old, Next Bank already offers the most complete product line of any digital bank in Taiwan, thanks to the extensive choice of modules and the ease of integrating them with our existing products. So unlike other banks, our IT team is never a block to the business.”

Eric Lee, Chief Information Officer at Next Bank

The assurance of experience

Reputation was another key reason why Next Bank selected Temenos. Eric notes that Temenos was able to demonstrate deep knowledge of the Taiwanese market and a successful track record of deployments with other banks in the region. For example, in 2022, Shanghai Commercial and Savings Bank appointed Temenos to replace its legacy core systems. The success of that deployment gave Eric and his team the proof they were looking for. And plans for Temenos to open a dedicated support hub in Taiwan have provided further reassurance.

What really stands out about Temenos is how it balances the advantages of global scale with the forensic knowledge of specific markets.”

Eric Lee, Chief Information Officer at Next Bank

Other institutions in Taiwan are looking at the Next Bank story with interest. “The balance of standardization and configuration of the Temenos composable banking platform delivers the agility, speed, and cost-effectiveness that can be a good option for legacy and neobanks alike,” says Eric. It also means that separate bank branches can use the same instance of the platform, rather than needing to deploy their own core system. And the extra competition will be a good thing, he adds. “In this way, we can have more industry exchanges, which is helpful for talent training and innovating the ecosystem.”

Region

Asia Pacific

Solutions

Core Banking

Sector

Challenger Banks
Retail Banking

Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

BanCoppel is one of the largest organizations in Mexico, which includes brands such as Afore Coppel and Tiendas Coppel. BanCoppel was the first to offer loans to Mexicans who had no possibility of proving their income, providing them with microloans for small purchases with store credit since 1941. To continue its technological transformation, driving modern banking services, the bank selected Temenos core banking platform. The implementation of this platform will not only provide the bank with greater efficiency and sustainability but will also support BanCoppel’s digital transformation project.

BanCoppel will benefit from Temenos’ proven technology leadership, extensive experience in Mexico, and strong reputation with existing customers. The Temenos core banking platform will enable the bank to continue to scale efficiently as well as offer an integrated ecosystem of easy and accessible banking services.

“Historically, the mass market in Mexico has been underserved by conventional banking, with much less access to credit and financial services. Our objective with this partnership with Temenos is to continue being the favorite bank of the popular class in Mexico, providing solutions that improve their quality of life. This transformation project will increase efficiency by creating an open ecosystem with easy integration through APIs, which will allow us to create easy, simple and more accessible banking services. Temenos has a proven reputation in Latin America and supports banks with a mission of financial inclusion – we look forward to collaborating together and creating a new era of banking.”

Juan Manuel Fernández Islas, Director of IT, Digital Transformation & Operations at BanCoppel

Region

Latin America

Solutions

Core Banking

Sector

Retail Banking

Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

At a Glance

● Reduce onboarding to loan application completion to 5 minutes from days

● 40% lower operational costs

● Time to launch new products to market cut by third

● 25% increase in customer base since launch

● 80% improvement in workflows and efficiencies

In just over a decade, Ijarah Finance has become an established part of the Saudi financial landscape. It provides Sharia-compliant integrated financial leasing services to 50,000 customers across the Kingdom, growth that has been built on a commitment to honesty, customer service and innovation. Now, these values have been applied to ‘Mora Finance’ a new digital lending platform built in partnership with Temenos. Mora’s easy, fast, and safe financing solution has attracted more than 10,000 registrations in four months, since launching in March 2023. It includes cash loans and product financing; with other business products to follow later in 2023.

At Ijarah Finance, we are committed to transforming the way people manage their personal finances. Our vision is to become a leading digital personal finance company, empowering individuals to take control of their financial well-being and achieve their dreams. We’re leveraging the latest technology to provide innovative solutions that simplify financial management and planning. Our customers are at the heart of everything we do. We’re dedicated to providing exceptional user experiences and personalized support.”

Fayez A. Al-Fayez, CEO at Ijarah Finance

Empowering citizens

Launched in 2016, Saudi Arabia is now well into its ambitious ‘Vision 2030’ transformation. Digitization is at the heart of its broad commitment to modernize every aspect of the Kingdom, and personal finance is fundamental to that plan. Citizens who are more able to access financial services and loans become more powerful consumers, and in turn support the shift to a consumer-driven and entrepreneurial economy.

Ijarah Finance identified this and has developed a new, fully automated personal lending platform. Named ‘Mora’, it is the amongst first wholly digital lending solution in KSA and offers customers the chance to apply for and secure personal loans in less than five minutes. That speed is partly enabled by the Kingdom’s move to democratize its data, meaning financial companies such as Ijarah can tap into national databases that record an individual’s income and credit history. But access to data is meaningless without the technology to fetch and process it. For this, Ijarah selected the Temenos Banking Platform to build Mora on top‌ of.

The result is the Kingdom’s first fully digital loan application and approval service. So far, 5,000 Saudi citizens have secured loans via Mora, while registrations are forecast to more than double by the end of 2023, reaching 25,000.

Though a digital solution, Mora is also appearing on shop floors, as in-store product financing agents advise customers to download the app rather than join the hours-long queues to submit their paperwork in the traditional way.

Retail customers can now just head to the till with their Mora app, show their loan approval, and walk out with their product. It’s a better customer experience for them, and really efficient for the retailers too.”

Jamshed Afzal, Chief Technology Architect at Ijarah Finance

A platform for now and the future

Mora is the first solution that Ijarah Finance has built on the Temenos Banking Platform. Indeed, the partnership, which began in 2021, was prompted by the shortcomings of the company’s previous technology stack. Unlike Temenos’ unified and composable platform, Ijarah Finance had relied on a complex integration of multiple vendors. That stilted innovation, and so Ijarah’s ability to launch new products efficiently.

“The best part of the Temenos platform is that it is one single, fully integrated, core banking solution. Everything is all in one box.” Jamshed Afzal Chief Technology Architect, Ijarah

Mora has been built using Temenos’ core banking and digital services, with Temenos XAI about to be deployed too. These solutions have not only aided the development of Mora, but also give Ijarah access to other capabilities and services that they can switch on anytime in the future. For example, Ijarah has also invested in Temenos Payments Hub, with a view to developing payment processing services in the future; and is also exploring Temenos Financial Crime and Mitigation (FCM) and native analytics tools.

The Temenos platform is so enriched. You never have to look for additional software to fulfill a requirement. Rather, the solution itself provides the answer.”

Jamshed Afzal, Chief Technology Architect at Ijarah Finance

Imagination is the only limit for Ijarah. The API architecture of the Temenos Banking Platform has consigned intricate and costly integrations to the past, while the customizability and extendibility of modules allow Ijarah to build highly personalized customer experiences and flex to evolving regulations.

“Every country, even every bank in a country, has its own needs. A rigid platform creates overheads and compromises, whereas the Temenos platform can be easily configured. So you become fearless. You always know that you’re going to be able to adapt to local and organizational needs” Jamshed Afzal Chief Technology Architect, Ijarah

The result is a newfound agility and scalability that will become increasingly important as Ijarah looks to build out Mora with new features and create new products and services that they can bring to market at breakneck speed. These benefits will become amplified when Ijarah migrates Mora to the cloud version later this year. That had not been possible earlier because of the Kingdom’s strict data sovereignty laws and the absence of a public cloud hyperscaler. But with the Temenos platform agnostic to deployment environments, this did not delay progress. Mora was launched on-premises, and Ijarah was then able to make the decision to move to Oracle cloud as soon as an infrastructure option became available.

Trust in the tried and tested

When you’re building a product designed to transform a nation, you don’t want to leave anything to chance. This was one of the principles that brought Ijarah to the doors of Temenos.

Scale without order can be complex. Whereas other global technology companies are little more than a loose amalgamation of disconnected services, Temenos is a single entity—a unified platform of integrated and complementary solutions, all accessed via a single API connection. Put simply, this makes things work easily. Mundane and repetitive tasks are automated, reducing development and operational workloads. Data can be leveraged between applications, with these insights used to deliver superior customer experiences. All the while, costs and lead times come down, cutting the time to market for new products, and ensuring new revenues are realized faster.

The success is in the numbers

Ijarah has seen an immediate return on its partnership with Temenos. Average loan approvals are already running at a higher conversion rate per day, and are expected to ramp up by 4 -5 folds per day by autumn 2023. Speed has been a key driver. Previously, it took new customers days to register and apply for a loan, leaving many frustrated (some of whom will have abandoned their application). Today, new customers of Mora can go from initial onboarding to loan confirmation in less than five minutes, all from the convenience of their mobile device (Ijarah will be launching a web version of the Mora app later in the year). And more are doing just that—Ijarah has seen a 25% increase in its customer base since launching Mora.

More customers at less cost is another key takeaway. Operational spending is expected to be reduced by 40% in year one, a combination of automating processes, consolidating systems, and outsourcing maintenance. In turn, Ijarah has more budget and time to deploy to new ventures, and importantly, more inclination too. It now takes them around one month to develop and push new features and products to market, just a third of the time it took before.

“Previously, we had to write code for everything. That code had to be tested. With Temenos, integrations are low code, so everything is accelerated. This has given us a big advantage” Jamshed Afzal Chief Technology Architect, Ijarah

This improved proximity from the design to the revenue stage emboldens the appetite for innovation and enables action. Ijarah reports that workflows and efficiencies have improved by 80% since partnering with Temenos. A credit card and e-wallet are the next products that Ijarah is now developing and will deploy on the Temenos Banking Platform by the end of 2023.

All these markers of success combine to improve profitability, with a 40% increase in the return on equity.

The Temenos platform is resilient, robust, scalable and adaptable to change. These are all ‘must-have’ features you need in a world-class banking technology. It will continue to facilitate our market growth.”

Jamshed Afzal, Chief Technology Architect at Ijarah Finance

Region

Middle East & Africa

Solutions

Core Banking
Digital Front Office

Sector

Other Financial Institution
Retail Banking

Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

Launched in 2002, Rawbank aims to drive economic growth in the Democratic Republic of the Congo by providing financial services to retail, business, and corporate clients. In just over 20 years, Rawbank has expanded to become the largest commercial bank in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

As the bank expanded its share of the market, it needed to scaleup in its lending division. Previously, Rawbank assessed loan applications manually—a time-consuming and labor-intensive method that offered limited insight into the probability of clients defaulting on repayments. Moving forward, the bank wanted to improve its decision making and minimize exposure to risk by gaining a deeper understanding of applicants. In addition, the bank looked to accelerate the approvals process to deliver a higher standard of service.

The use of Temenos XAI enabled us to gain the full benefits of AI in managing risk and increasing profits while using models which we can easily understand, analyze and augment with our expertise. I have been really impressed with the level of service we get from Temenos.”

Nadeem Akhtar, Director Performance Branch Network at Rawbank

Realizing that automation offered the smartest approach, Rawbank decided to use the Temenos Explainable AI (XAI) platform to streamline and improve its risk assessment for retail, SME and Corporate lending. The solution will enable the bank to rapidly develop, deploy, and integrate predictive risk models into its credit scoring workflows to determine the likelihood of applicants meeting repayment schedules. XAI will also provide transparency into how it calculates credit scores, enabling Rawbank to explain lending decisions to clients and regulatory authorities.

With XAI providing deeper insight into loan applications, Rawbank expects to reduce its loss given default rate and increase net profits on lending considerably. As well as protecting against default risk, increased levels of automation will improve the speed and efficiency of loan approvals, ensuring higher quality of service. And the bank will be able to continuously optimize the predictive models to ensure accuracy.

Region

Middle East & Africa

Solutions

Digital Front Office

Sector

Business Banking
Corporate & Commercial Banking
Retail Banking

Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

The first B Corp bank in Australia, Beyond Bank, is 100% owned by its customers. The bank is dedicated to the well-being of both its clients and the communities while offering its customers a better rate, fairer fees, responsible lending, superior customer service, and a multi-award-winning internet banking and mobile app.

As a B Corp. bank, Beyond Bank is certified as a business that meets high standards of social and environmental impact, ensuring its practices and outputs benefit all people, communities, and the planet. The bank is committed to supporting and helping the community thrive.

Temenos Journey Manager was key to help us to integrate in the back end, with the CRM, the core banking, and the tech partners.”

Loïc tassinari, Digital Experience Manager at Beyond Bank

Beyond Bank wanted to ensure customers trying to open accounts via their mobile phones enjoyed a straightforward, friction-free experience. It is important to provide clients with more cognitively light digital experiences. To develop a new omnichannel acquisition journey for its products and services, Beyond Bank implemented Temenos digital banking. After integrating the Temenos platform with its core banking and identity verification systems, Beyond Bank launched a single, mobile-friendly onboarding process for nine separate products.

Beyond Bank offers multiple ways for client interaction, whether via local branches, call centers, or through the award-winning internet banking and mobile app. User feedback has been overwhelmingly positive, and the bank uses the highly scalable Temenos solution to support a further 80 account servicing processes. Thanks to the Temenos Journey Manager online form at Beyond Bank is simple and quick to use, enabling customers to open a membership in under 10 minutes.

Region

Asia Pacific

Solutions

Digital Front Office

Sector

Retail Banking

Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

At a Glance

● Supports 40% growth in customer volumes and 40% boost in assets under management

● Enables the launch of first-of-a-kind funds transfer services via mobile and online

● 50% faster to launch new products to the market

● Went live in just 10 months despite significant disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic

● Breaks new ground as the 1st Libyan bank to deploy the Temenos digital platform

Already one of the top banks in Libya, Assaray Trade and Investment Bank (ATIB) has ambitious plans to become the leading digital bank not only in its home market but across the whole North African region. To achieve this, ATIB focuses on delivering first-class services that win growing numbers of customers, while building streamlined internal operations to attract the very best banking talents.

Farouk K. Laabidi, General Manager, ATIB, explains: “10 years ago, ATIB primarily focused its efforts on the corporate market. However, with the ever-increasing demand for retail online and mobile banking services among consumers, especially in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, the bank has strategically expanded its services into the retail banking space. Targeting these digitally-savvy customers is a key strategic goal for us.”

Setting the standard for innovation

Operating in Libya presents significant challenges for banks, as the country’s national infrastructure is currently in the process of development and its political situation has experienced some periods of unpredictability, which can present slowness to growth. Many banks have been unrushed to embrace digital technologies, with some not fully integrated to the national payment system and unable to accept all types of electronic transfers. But where other service providers see limitations, ATIB recognizes huge opportunities for building long-term success. ATIB believes that innovation is a matter of culture, it starts from the top, and all employees are encouraged to embrace it.

Farouk K. Laabidi continues: “We have focused on digital transformation since 2014, bringing many innovative services to market. For example, during the difficult times of cash shortages in the period of 2016–2019, we were one of the leading banks to launch reliable prepaid payment cards and offer an electronic wallet application that allows users to purchase goods via their mobile devices. As well as enhancing and developing new digital services, we are now excited by the possibilities of open banking.”

However, ATIB realized that its existing core and digital banking solutions were starting to restrict its ability to innovate. Building tailored services for different customer segments was a difficult, time-consuming process, and the bank did not have the modern API functionality to interface with third-party services. To sharpen its competitive edge, ATIB started to look for a more advanced, customer-centric solution.

Choosing a solution with extensive capabilities

Keen to overhaul and modernize many components of its banking infrastructure, ATIB looked for a partner with extensive knowledge and experience of large-scale transformation projects. The bank decided to deploy an integrated suite of core and digital banking solutions from Temenos including Temenos Analytics, and Temenos Payments.

“We knew that Temenos is a global leader for core banking solutions, and they demonstrated deep understanding of our challenges and the future of the banking sector. Temenos technology is very impressive, especially the product development and API integration capabilities, which would allow us to connect to many different third-party services.”

Farouk Laadibi, General Manager at ATIB

Adopting a remote deployment model

Working with Temenos and Temenos business partner Prema Consulting, ATIB kicked off the implementation of the solutions, starting with Temenos core banking in a two-phase project that was completed in just ten months. To optimize performance and efficiency, the bank runs the core platform on the Microsoft Azure public cloud.

Dunia M. Ajaj, Head of PMO at ATIB, comments: “The implementation was complex, and we experienced huge disruption due to the COVID-19 pandemic. After one month we faced severe travel restrictions, but Temenos showed great flexibility by switching to a remote deployment strategy. Going live in ten months was a great result, with Temenos delivering excellent support to keep the project moving forward.”

Muawiya Abu Jubain, CEO, Prema-C, added “We believe that ATIB’s project is a strategic project for us, knowing the ambitions the bank management and employees have in deploying the world renowned Temenos core banking system. And we wanted to be part of this exciting journey that brings growth and innovation to ATIB. Despite the pandemic, we managed to reach the bank’s goal of going live in a record time of ten months. This could have never been achieved without the dedication of ATIB’s team, Prema consultants, and the Temenos project management team and consultants.”

Transforming the customer experience

Using Temenos core banking, ATIB enhanced many of its customer services. For example, the bank used the rich integration functionality of the Temenos solution to deliver greater flexibility to customers using its prepaid payment cards. Whenever users need to top up their card with funds from their electronic wallet or account, they can now manage the process quickly and easily via their mobile device.

“Temenos core banking delivers so many great capabilities; from high levels of security to close control over financing arrangements. We have also halved our time to market for new products and services with the Temenos solution.”

Abdulmohaimen M. Matoug, Head of Digital Transformation (Revolv) at ATIB

Using Temenos Analytics, ATIB adopted a more customer-centric approach to development, as Farouk K. Laabidi explains: “With our old core platform, we could not gain a detailed picture of customer behavior. Using Temenos Analytics, we analyze their preferences and requirements in depth, and build more relevant, personalized offerings closely aligned with their financial needs and lifestyles.”

Breaking new ground in the Libyan market

Since then, ATIB has worked with Prema Consulting to implement Temenos digital banking platform – becoming the first bank in North Africa to harness the cutting-edge capabilities of the solution. The bank went live on an on-premises instance of the solution in a phased deployment process, with the business partner helping to integrate the platform with Temenos core banking and a series of third-party solutions.

ATIB has used Temenos to develop and launch a brand new feature-rich digital banking service for retail and corporate clients: ATIB Online. Accessible web and mobile app, that allows users to manage their accounts, monitor transactions, top up local and international payment cards in various currencies, and purchase mobile phone vouchers thanks to integrations with several network operators and internet service providers.

In another breakthrough move, ATIB recently added transferring funds between two bank accounts within Libya, as Farouk K Laabidi explains: “We added an integration with the national payment system to allow users to transfer money online or via their mobile. This represents a first-of-a-kind service for the Libyan market, so once again we are leading the way in terms of innovation.”

Offering customers the speed and convenience of transacting online without having to head to a bank branch has had a hugely positive impact on satisfaction levels. And ATIB Bank plans to add more products and services to the digital application, as Farouk K Laabidi notes: “We are around 60 percent of the way towards reaching our digitalization objectives. We are planning to use Temenos digital banking to create online loan origination and onboarding workflows in 2024, and we will also implement Temenos Payments Hub.”

Reaching new customers

The partnership with Temenos is helping ATIB to achieve its goal of increasing market share and becoming one of the banking leaders in Libya and beyond. The enhanced portfolio of products and services has contributed to a 40 percent boost in customer volumes, and the bank has grown its assets under management by 40 percent since partnering with Temenos. In particular, during the first three months of offering ATIB Online, the platform gained 5,000 new users—and is now aiming to onboard 20,000 by the end of 2023, and 100,000 by the end of 2026.

“Working with the Temenos solutions, we are reaching more clients than ever before. Not only are we consolidating our leadership in the corporate banking space, but we are extending our share of the retail banking market, too. As we launch more digital services with Temenos digital banking platform, we are confident that this upwards trend will continue well into the future.”

Dunia M. Ajaj, Head of PMO at ATIB

A Step Ahead of the Competition

Within ATIB, the Temenos solutions have had a significant impact on workflow efficiency. Higher levels of automation removed the need for manual interventions during many key processes, enabling employees to work more productively and reducing overall costs. Furthermore, this focus on efficiency has helped ATIB reduce its cost-to-income by up to 15 percent, and to achieve a strong return on equity of between 15 and 17 percent.

ATIB also believes that deploying a modern, world-leading suite of banking solutions will help to attract the brightest bankers in Libya.

As the Libyan banking market becomes more digitalized and embraces Open Banking, ATIB is in prime position to take full advantage, as Abdulmohaimen M. Matoug explains: “The Temenos solutions will enable us to integrate with many different partners, not only among financial services providers but also airlines and utilities companies to provide customers with more convenient payment methods.”

“With Temenos, we believe the sky is the limit on what we can achieve. Whatever innovative ideas we conceive, we know we can develop and bring them to market using the solutions. Thanks to our partnership with Temenos, we are moving towards our goal of becoming the leading digital bank in Libya and the wider region and staying well ahead of our competition.”

Dunia M. Ajaj, Head of PMO at ATIB

We partnered successfully with

Prema Consulting

Prema Consulting is a fast growing IT company with Temenos core banking functional and technical skilled consultants.

Microsoft

Microsoft’s Financial Services group helps financial firms leverage technology to amplify the impact their people can deliver to drive business success.

Region

Middle East & Africa

Solutions

Core Banking
Digital Front Office
Payments

Sector

Business Banking
Corporate & Commercial Banking
Islamic Banking
Retail Banking

Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

At a Glance

• 1.5 million new digital accounts, including 78% net-new clients, since launch of new mobile app

• 4.9 out of five rating for unique mobile app that provides access to seven financial services

• 100% increase in market share, reaching top-four position in Taiwan for digital banking accounts

• 3x faster time to market for new services with latest upgrade of Temenos core banking

In a crowded marketplace, you need to think outside the box and offer something unique to succeed. That’s the challenge for Bank SinoPac operating in Taiwan, one of the most oversaturated banking markets in the Asia Pacific region. Part of Taiwanese finance group SinoPac Holdings, the bank serves individual and corporate clients and also operates in China, Hong Kong, Macao, Vietnam, and the United States.

Irene Huang, Chief Digital Officer, Bank SinoPac, explains: “We are competing against 38 commercial banks for a slice of a limited market. But there are opportunities, too. For example, there is high demand for digital and mobile banking services among younger people, especially those we call High Earners, Not Rich Yet or HENRYs, who form an important target demographic.”

One key component in Bank SinoPac’s strategy is a focus on digital innovation, as Irene Huang adds: “On the one hand, it’s about embedding new technologies, such as open APIs and artificial intelligence (AI). But it’s also about the right mindset, and always thinking of the customer experience when designing products. While many Taiwanese banks are conservative in their thinking, we adopt a more innovative approach.”

Taking the first steps on the transformation journey

This strategy dates back as far as 2009, when Bank SinoPac began to transform its core banking environment. To replace inflexible legacy systems, the bank selected Temenos core banking. They migrated previously data related to three million customers onto the platform. The move led to major efficiency gains: close of business (COB) processes ran 70 percent faster, and infrastructure costs were cut in half.

We chose Temenos core banking for the modern architecture and full suite of core banking functionality, such as product development and secure data management. The deployment ran very smoothly, with excellent support from Temenos. Temenos has delivered the high stability and performance needed to support our domestic and international operations ever since.”

Irene Huang, Chief Digital Officer at Bank SinoPac

Entering the era of open banking

Since then, Bank SinoPac has worked with Temenos to upgrade the core platform in 2012 and 2020. The latest upgrade provided access to advanced API integration functionality, which enabled the bank to take advantage of the open finance initiative launched in Taiwan in 2020. The bank uses the open APIs to interface with the systems of 12 partner organizations and SinoPac Holdings subsidiaries.

“One of the best things about Temenos is they continuously roll out new functionality, which has allowed us to offer open banking services. The robust data governance capabilities of Temenos core banking help us comply with stringent local regulations. Plus, the platform gives us the scalability to support AI initiatives launched by SinoPac Holdings, which generate huge volumes of data.”

Irene Huang, Chief Digital Officer, Bank SinoPac

For the internal teams at Bank SinoPac, Temenos solution has proved easy to use, as Irene Huang confirms: “Temenos core banking is a very intuitive platform. For example, the preconfigured components simplify work such as product development, eliminating the need for us to write lines of code.”

Developing a first-of-a-kind mobile banking app

Using Temenos core banking has enabled Bank SinoPac to push ahead with its innovation strategy. For example, the latest upgrade helped the bank achieve a threefold improvement in time to market for new services. The solution also helped the bank kick off the development of new digital banking services, such as the groundbreaking DAWHO app, which stands for Digital Account with Happiness and Opulence.

Irene Huang explains: “In Taiwan, banks typically offer mobile apps to manage only one service, such as savings or payments, causing a fragmented experience when users want to complete several different transactions. With DAWHO, we aimed for an ‘ecosystem’ approach that would offer customers a frictionless digital journey and enable them to access multiple services through one portal.”

In a first for the Taiwanese market, DAWHO integrates seven services: deposits, wealth management, foreign exchange, personal loans, mortgages, credit cards, and securities—all provided by Bank SinoPac or a SinoPac Holdings subsidiary. Temenos core banking processes all customer transactions made through the DAWHO app and enables the bank to create and deploy new product features.

Attracting an extra million customers

The DAWHO app has been a huge success, giving Bank SinoPac a valuable differentiator in the Taiwanese market. User feedback has been extremely positive, with satisfaction scores of 4.9 out of five on the Apple App Store. And in just over three years since the launch of DAWHO, the bank has seen 1.5 million customers open digital accounts—including 78 percent, or 1.17 million, net-new clients.

The app has helped Bank SinoPac to reach younger market segments, as Irene Huang notes: “Before the launch of DAWHO, the average age of our retail banking customers was 47. Today, it is 33—indicating that we have increased our appeal to generations Y and Z, including the HENRYs.”

This surge in customer numbers translates into a much bigger slice of the Taiwanese market. “We are now ranked number four in Taiwan in terms of digital banking account holders,” explains Irene Huang. “And overall, we have grown our market share from around five to ten percent since the rollout of DAWHO.”

Refining the digital experience

In the latest collaboration, Bank SinoPac is using Temenos digital banking to reshape and unify the user experience across all its digital delivery channels—including its e-banking web portal and mobile app, DACARD payments app, and integrated DAWHO app. The project is progressing well, and the bank expects to complete the enhancements and launch the new digital ecosystem early in 2024.

Irene Huang adds: “Our design team finds Temenos digital banking very useful for developing new layouts for our digital portals. They also highlight the value of Temenos Visualizer, which gives them the tools to create a consistent look and feel for all of our apps. Once live, we will be able to roll out updates to all four digital portals at once through Temenos digital banking, rather than having to run them separately.”

“Temenos has been a very important partner to Bank SinoPac over many years. It’s a collaboration founded on great solutions and great support and we hope it will continue well into the future. Working with Temenos has enabled us to build innovative services that help us to stand out and succeed in an immensely challenging market, and to broaden our customer base.”

Irene Huang, Chief Digital Officer at Bank SinoPac

Region

Asia Pacific

Solutions

Core Banking
Digital Front Office

Sector

Business Banking
Corporate & Commercial Banking
Retail Banking

Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

At a Glance

• 1 million daily transactions processed seamlessly at peak times with Temenos core banking

• 3x faster time to market for new services compared to typical core systems

• 6 months to complete new acquired USD 2.2 billion bank integration that has tripled customer base

Established in the Kingdom of Bahrain in 2006, Al Salam Bank is a pioneering Sharia-compliant bank. It offers an extensive range of retail banking services, together with corporate banking, private banking, asset management, and treasury services, and serves tens of thousands of customers throughout the Kingdom.

Since its launch, Al Salam Bank has pursued an aggressive strategy of expansion, targeting triple-digit growth across all metrics and building income from diverse lines of business. This approach has helped Al Salam Bank establish itself as the fastest-growing bank in the region and an influential force in the Islamic banking industry.

Mohammed Saleh, VP of Information Technology at Al Salam Bank, comments: “Starting in 2010, we have made a series of high-profile acquisitions. Along with organic growth, this strategy has significantly increased our customer base, assets, and income, and helped Al Salam Bank grow into the biggest Islamic bank in Bahrain.”

Sustaining the growth curve

Although acquisitions have been the driving force behind Al Salam Bank’s impressive growth, they also add significant complexity to operations. Each acquisition brings additional employees and customers for the bank to onboard, along with new systems and processes to integrate. Managing this complexity takes a strong vision, strategy, and execution—backed by a firm technology foundation. For core banking technology, Al Salam Bank counts on Temenos, which has served as a key partner since day one.

“Our management originally chose Temenos core banking platform based on the strength of its reputation and the flexibility of its development and integration framework. Unlike other core banking systems, which can be quite rigid and hard to customize, Temenos makes it easy for us to adapt to new requirements from the business, and rapidly roll out new functionality and products. This agility is invaluable to us as a bank that’s constantly growing and changing.”

Mohammed Saleh, VP of Information Technology at Al Salam Bank

Today, Al Salam Bank uses Temenos core banking modules to support its operations—from deposits and treasury services to wealth management, all in compliance with Sharia banking principles.

Harnessing fast, flexible core banking

Used by Al Salam Bank for more than 15 years, Temenos has more than lived up to its reputation for core banking excellence. The bank has made multiple extensions, integrations, and upgrades on the platform, which has proven to be both fast and flexible.

Mohammed Saleh says: “Most of the banks that we have acquired over the years were using different core banking systems. When we migrated them onto Temenos, they really noticed the difference, especially in terms of the platform’s flexibility and speed to market for new servicers. For instance, at other banks, it can typically take six months to bring new products to market. With Temenos, we can bring new products to market three times faster, in no more than one to two months,.”

Managing millions of daily transactions

Supported by Temenos, Al Salam Bank has been able to maintain its impressive growth trajectory and keep its banking services in constant evolution. The past year in particular has been an important period of expansion and renewal for the bank. In early 2022, Al Salam Bank completed an upgrade of its core banking system.

Immediately after this upgrade, the bank made a major acquisition, taking on Ithmaar Bank’s consumer banking business in a transaction worth USD 2.2 billion. With the acquisition, Al Salam Bank tripled its customer base—and thanks to Temenos, was able to onboard the new customers and their data swiftly and smoothly.

“We transformed from different core banking system to map and migrate all of the customer data. We also followed governance from Temenos services teams to ensure that we followed the correct steps during the migration. This enabled us to complete the process in record time: the project took just six months from start to finish. What’s more, it was a very seamless transitions; we were able to bring the new business onto Temenos without any disruption to the customer experience.”

Mohammed Saleh, VP of Information Technology at Al Salam Bank

Growing strong with first-rate services

As Al Salam Bank continues its journey of expansion, it can count on Temenos to provide a scalable core banking foundation, capable of handling significantly higher customer and transaction volumes without missing a beat.

“When we tripled our customer base with our latest acquisition, we anticipated that there might be some performance or volume issues,” admits Mohammed Saleh. “Instead, it proved incredibly easy to scale our core banking environment within the same infrastructure footprint. This allowed us to avoid making additional hardware investments, helping to keep our costs down.”

“Alongside this increase in our customer base, we’ve seen a big jump in transactions. We now process around 400,000 transactions a day. At peak times, like at month end when salaries are paid, we can reach up to one million daily transactions. Temenos core banking supports it all flawlessly; it gives us great confidence to know that the platform can handle pretty much anything we throw at it.”

Mohammed Saleh, VP of Information Technology at Al Salam Bank

Reaching new heights of success

Buoyed by its latest acquisition, as well as the organic expansion of key business lines, Al Salam Bank has seen its banking business grow from strength to strength. In 2022, the bank posted a total operating income of USD 412 million, a 42 percent increase on the previous year. During the same period, Al Salam Bank saw net profits rise by 48 percent to reach more than USD 83 million.

Mohammed Saleh concludes: “Temenos has been a vital contributor to our remarkable growth. They’ve been by our side through it all, as we’ve made many acquisitions and expanded our horizons to new lines of business and customer segments. We consider Temenos to be much more than a technology provider; they are a truly invaluable partner to Al Salam Bank. Together, we can look ahead to a bright future.”

Region

Middle East & Africa

Solutions

Core Banking

Sector

Business Banking
Corporate & Commercial Banking
Islamic Banking
Retail Banking

Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

At a Glance

• Achieves first-mover advantage with the first fully digital banking services in Ethiopia

• 1,000+ new accounts opened each day, helping to increase financial inclusion

• 4 months to implement Temenos digital banking

• Takes seconds to process and approve loans applications, rather than months previously

Established in 1996, Bank of Abyssinia is currently the largest privately held bank in Ethiopia, and plans to become the leading commercial bank in East Africa by 2030. To reach this milestone, the bank is on a mission to grow its customer base, boosting financial inclusion in the country and beyond.

Helping more Ethiopians access banking services

According to the National Bank of Ethiopia, 75 percent of Ethiopians don’t have a bank account and up to 40 percent of all bank branches in the country are located near to the capital. For many years, banks have struggled to expand their reach beyond urban centers as setting up and running branches in rural locations involves significant upfront capital expenditure and high operational costs.

However, market conditions are rapidly changing in Ethiopia, as more people gain regular and reliable access to the internet. Bank of Abyssinia identified an opportunity to help more people access financial services by building a 100 percent digital banking offering.

Addis Tadesse, Director for Application Management at Bank of Abyssinia, explains: “We’ve offered digital banking services for many years, but most of these services still required our customers to visit a branch at some stage – for instance, to bring identification to open new accounts. Also, some processes such as loan applications required in-person consultations. If we could make the experience completely digital, we would be able to reach underserved communities in remote areas and dramatically increase our market share.”

With no other bank in Ethiopia offering a fully digital service, Bank of Abyssinia decided to pioneer the new approach and searched for a technology partner to support its initiative. Crucially, the bank targeted a solution provider that would help it deliver a truly seamless digital experience and ensure that it could meet strict regulatory requirements for new digital banks set by the National Bank of Ethiopia.

Finding the perfect solution

Bank of Abyssinia decided to build 100 percent digital banking services with Temenos. At the same time, the bank chose to upgrade its Temenos core banking system to ensure that it could provide customers with the very latest innovations in both digital and in-branch banking.

“We’ve used Temenos core banking for over 10 years and throughout that time we’ve seen how reliable, scalable and robust Temenos solutions are. For example, Temenos core banking has been easy to customize, and provides real-time reports that enable us to track the overall financial performance and efficiency of the bank. These in-depth insights help our executive leadership to make smarter operational decisions.”

Addis Tadesse, Director for Application Management at Bank of Abyssinia

Protecting against fraud

As the first bank in Ethiopia to launch entirely digital services, Bank of Abyssinia knew its new platform would be a potential target for fraudsters and cyber criminals. To safeguard against this risk, Bank of Abyssinia also decided to implement Temenos Financial Crime Mitigation—equipping the bank with the tools to spot and prevent illicit activity in near real-time.

“When your only interaction with new customers is online, it’s vital that you can verify their identity from the moment they sign up. With Temenos Financial Crime Mitigation, we can identify potential fraudsters and immediately prevent them from making transactions. And because Temenos digital banking is built with open banking in mind, we can easily integrate third-party identity solutions to support our Know-Your-Customer activities.”

Addis Tadesse, Director for Application Management at Bank of Abyssinia

Deepening partnerships

To achieve a rapid implementation, Bank of Abyssinia enlisted the support of Temenos business partner Xpert Digital to deploy Temenos digital banking, including the setup of an API integration with Idemia—the bank’s identity and security solution. Supported by Temenos and Xpert Digital, Temenos digital banking went live in just four months.

“Xpert Digital played a lead role in helping us design a digital banking ecosystem that is secure, reliable and, crucially, easy to use,” comments Addis Tadesse. “The Xpert Digital team went the extra mile by helping us to redesign key workflows for a completely digital environment incorporating best practices. For instance, they helped us to leverage integrations with Idemia to build efficient, highly secure and automated verification processes—allowing us to onboard customers rapidly and with confidence.”

Welcoming new digital customers

By building and launching end-to-end digital banking services with Temenos core and digital banking platforms, Bank of Abyssinia has significantly increased its customer base.

“Temenos gives us the tools we need to offer reliable, convenient and always-on digital banking services,” explains Addis Tadesse. “Today, through our Apollo service, customers can sign up for an account from their mobiles by submitting a video of themselves and a copy of their national identity card. With Temenos Financial Crime Mitigation and Idemia, we can run verification processes quickly and get new customers up and running with their new bank account within one day.”

“We’re impressed with the growth we have seen since we implemented Temenos digital banking. We are seeing up to 1,000 new accounts opened every day, and the majority of these are via our digital banking channel—and we expect this number to increase in the months ahead.”

Addis Tadesse, Director for Application Management at Bank of Abyssinia

Empowering more people to invest in their future

As well as offering digital account management services, Bank of Abyssinia enables customers to apply for loans via its mobile banking app—helping more people to access credit, as Addis Tadesse adds: “With Temenos digital banking, we can approve the loan and give our customer to their funds within a few seconds, as long as they meet our lending criteria, where previously this would take months.”

He concludes: “With Temenos, we’ve been able to bring a game-changing solution to the Ethiopian banking sector and empower our customers to bank with us confidently at any time and from any location. We look forward to strengthening our partnership with Temenos in the years ahead as we continue to develop our digital banking offerings and help more customers manage their money effectively.”

We partnered successfully with

Region

Middle East & Africa

Solutions

Core Banking
Digital Front Office
Financial Crime Mitigation

Sector

Business Banking
Corporate & Commercial Banking
Islamic Banking
Retail Banking

Next Bank

Next Bank – Taiwan’s newest bank launch is a lesson in speed and scalability

Taipei, Taiwan

At a Glance

• 3 months to migrate major acquisitions to Temenos core banking

• 45 days to launch branch operations in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia from scratch

• 50% efficiency gains in the back-office support highly cost-effective growth

• 49% rise in profits in 2022, a new record for Capital Bank

• 12 months for the subsidiary National Bank of Iraq to go live with Temenos core banking and payments hub

• Processed 188,000 payments in the first month after launch, with 99% STP rate

Established in 1995, the Capital Bank of Jordan (Capital Bank) specializes in commercial and investment banking services for retail and corporate clients. Capital Bank has developed into one of the top financial institutions in Jordan, and has built a strong regional presence through expansion into markets including Iraq and Saudi Arabia.

A spokesperson at the bank, says: “The last three years have been remarkable for our business. We’ve grown in Jordan to become the 3^rd largest bank, rising from the 15^th position in 2020, We also currently rank among the 50 largest banks in the Middle East.”

How has Capital Bank made such an impressive rise? With a strategy aimed at driving rapid expansion across local and regional markets, fueled and sustained by the bank’s longstanding partnership with Temenos.

Bringing on big acquisitions

Capital Bank has counted on Temenos core banking technology for more than a decade. As the bank ramped up its growth plans, it knew that its core banking model also needed to evolve.

A spokesperson at the bank explains: “In 2020, we began negotiations to acquire Bank Audi’s operations in Jordan and Iraq. They were a bank of similar size to us, so it was a serious undertaking, effectively doubling our operations. We wanted to bring them onto our Temenos core banking system, and we decided to upgrade to the latest release of Temenos in preparation for the integration.”

The upgrade primed Capital Bank to take advantage of a more modern system architecture and all-new functionality. It paved the way for a swift, smooth integration of the Bank Audi business; in all, it took between three to four months to complete the core banking migration.

Capital Bank’s expansion strategy took another leap forward in late 2022, with the acquisition completion of Société Générale Bank Jordan. Once more, Capital Bank was able to migrate the new business’ core banking operations to Temenos in a span of just three months. This allowed the bank to minimize disruption to both employees and customers, while unlocking the benefits of a larger operational footprint sooner.

We are very proud of what we have achieved with the acquisition of these two banks. It’s no small thing to integrate an entire business into your own in just a few months, but we were able to do it thanks to Temenos and the commitment of our project team. Having a strong core banking system, and people who are willing to go the extra mile, were instrumental to our success.”

Spokesperson at the bank

Deepening and expanding the partnership

With these latest acquisitions under its belt, Capital Bank turned its attention to a more established part of its business: the National Bank of Iraq. Acquired in 2005, the National Bank of Iraq deal has allowed Capital Bank to make inroads into an important regional market.

Until 2022, the bank had been running on a legacy core banking system. In that year, Capital Bank decided to also migrate the bank’s end-to-end operations to the Temenos core banking platform. At the same time, it also deployed the Temenos Payments Hub (TPH) at National Bank of Iraq, the first bank in its suite of companies to adopt the solution.

The relative size of the National Bank of Iraq (about twice as big as Capital Bank), and deploying TPH, made the project more complex than previous migrations. Yet it was completed within one year, noting that the project also involved bringing more than 25 third-party vendor integrations, deployment of four other brand-new systems, configuration of new automations, including with the central bank of Iraq, and translation of the system into Arabic. With all the testing completed, the actual migration was delivered in December 2023, taking 96hrs, with all the planned capabilities, dashboards, and metrics available from day one of go-live.

The work was led by one in-house project manager, with Temenos and ITSS Egypt, a Temenos partner, providing support.

This was a highly complex exercise, with many moving parts. Through countless hours of hard work, collaboration, and tireless efforts, we took just 12 months to transition the National Bank of Iraq to a cutting-edge core banking system and a new payments hub, resulting in smooth operations from day one.”

Spokesperson at the bank

The bank didn’t have to wait long to see the impact. In the first month after go-live, it processed 188,923 incoming and outgoing domestic and international payments, with a 99% STP rate. The project was also named ‘Best Core Banking Implementation: Best Project Implementation’ by IBSi as part of their 2023 Innovation Awards.

The partnership with Temenos has supported Capital Bank establish additional presence in Saudi Arabia. Two years ago, National Bank of Iraq received a banking license to launch a new branch in Riyadh, the country’s capital city. To get operations at the site up and running and start accepting customer transactions, the bank implemented a new instance of Temenos core banking, going live in just 45 days.

Recipe for success

A spokesperson at the bank is in no doubt about the game-changing nature of its expansion of Temenos to the National Bank of Iraq.

This new system will not only enhance operational efficiency but also support providing our customers with a superior digital banking experience. The achievement marks a significant milestone in our digital journey and positions us as a leading player in the banking industry.”

Spokesperson at the bank

Reflecting on the project, Izzidin Abusalameh points to several crucial factors. On the technical side, the availability of pre-configured out-of-the-box capabilities within both Temenos core banking and TPH meant the team could avoid building complex customizations. He also points to the value of having a meticulous project plan from the outset, detailing thousands of tasks, that acted as a reference throughout the project and ensured clarity and accountability at all times.

Culture was also an ingredient of success, says a spokesperson at the bank, “We had the right people, with relevant skills, experience and spirit, and enabled by our board with authority to make quick decisions.”

Supporting stellar operations

With Temenos core banking now deployed throughout its businesses, Capital Bank has a trusted and powerful platform for supporting its full range of banking products and services across retail, corporate, asset management, and more. When the bank wishes to enhance existing services or introduce all-new products, it uses Temenos to simplify and accelerate the process.

“Temenos core banking makes life easy for us,” confirms a spokesperson at the bank. “It’s essential for us, providing all the capabilities we need to support our banking operations. When we are building a new product or implementing a new bank business model, we put as much on the core as possible, because we know that Temenos is capable of supporting it.” In Temenos, Capital Bank has found a partner it can count on to keep expanding and improving this core banking universe.

Our partnership with Temenos is immensely valuable to us. Every year, Temenos releases new features and enhancements. They keep up with the latest technology developments and constantly bring something new to their customers.”

Spokesperson at the bank

Free to grow

Enabled by Temenos, Capital Bank has been able to grow without limits, adding new products, and winning more customers all while controlling cost and complexity. As operations have expanded, the bank has simultaneously lifted back-office efficiency by at least 50 percent.

The efficiency gains translate into a better experience for Capital Bank’s rapidly growing customer base. They can count on transactions to be processed quickly and accurately, and for service requests to be handled promptly. It allowed the bank to maintain high customer retention levels—crucial to the long-term success of its acquisitions—and to cultivate a reputation for service excellence that’s helping it win even more new business.

With Temenos core banking in place, along with the improvements we continue to make to processes and workflows, we have been able to bring much more efficiency to our back-office operations as we have grown. Compared to three years ago, our operational efficiency is at least 50 percent higher.”

Spokesperson at the bank

Fit for the future

Capital Bank’s hard work over the past three years has led to impressive financial results, including record profits with a 17% increase over the previous year. The bank considers Temenos to be an important contributor to this success, and an integral part of its plans for the future. No surprise then that it plans to upgrade all its banks to the latest release 23 of the Temenos core banking throughout 2024 and extend TPH to Capital Bank of Jordan as well.

A spokesperson at the bank continues: “We have big plans for the coming years and wherever that journey takes us, we know that Temenos will be accompanying us. Through all our growth and change, Temenos core banking has been the one constant.”

We partnered successfully with

ITSS provides high-quality services for banks with Temenos Transact in parts of Africa, Middle East, Asia and Latin America.

Region

Middle East & Africa

Solutions

Core Banking
Payments

Sector

Business Banking
Corporate & Commercial Banking
Retail Banking

The future of banking starts here

Discover how our platform helps financial institutions navigate change, embrace new opportunities, and deliver smarter, faster banking. Together, we embrace the future of finance – Leading Banking Forward.

Contact the team

We're here to help.

Attend an event

Join us live and be part of the conversation.

Explore resources

Expert insights, guides, and news.

Newsletter sign-up

Subscribe for Temenos news, updates, events.