IBS Journal November 2015


© Sibos


Continuing this theme, Huse says


‘I don’t expect any one in the room to have sympathy for banks, but they are quite expensive to run – such as oper- ating costs and dealing with legacy systems’. While banks may well pine for drives to digitalisation, it costs money, which has to be found somewhere. Vincent Minna, CFO MENA region &


Geneva trading desks, Bunge EMEA – an agribusiness and food company – says there is a real problem with branches at some banks. While he may use the same bank in Singapore and across Europe, each branch is not on the same digital level. It has a ‘fragmented’ feel which complicates matters. Huse counters with ‘paper works


but we could do better – but it’s not radically broken’. And Sakelaropoulos adds that his company began its ‘elec- tronic documentation journey’ in 2002 and says ‘if we sit and wait for the per- fect technology, we’ll never move’.


Questions, questions With that in mind, an audience mem- ber asks ‘are we seeing tremendous momentum or a glacial pace’ to full digitalisation – or at least something close to full. It’s not easy to quantify in terms of


an exact timeline, but Norman thinks the process will take around 20 years – something Bisagni disagrees with. He adds that the banking industry is ‘heavily regulated and we can’t do anything we wish’. Overall, the bank representative’s


comments say nothing new or par- ticularly memorable. They all say the banks are working on improving the digital process for trade finance; and cited examples of innovation labs being created. However, near the end of the talk


an audience member asks ‘if banks are so heavily regulated, then maybe you’re not the right guys for develop- ing digitalisation’. No response adequately addresses


this point. There might be a case for banks to


outsource digitalisation or look at how regulations are allegedly hampering progress.


Conclusion Success? Yes. Because of its location, there was


good representation from Asia and Oce- ania. Delegates from Bangkok Bank, Indonesia-based Bank Mandiri, Maybank in Malaysia, Azerbaijan’s Pasha Bank and the State Bank of Vietnam. Lots of big names as expected from these nearer regions: Bank of China, Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubushi UFJ, Commonwealth Bank of Australia and Mizuho Bank. The closing plenary didn’t reveal much, but the official number was that 8,219 delegates attended. Out of that total figure, only 25% of


the attendees were women according to Sibos. (It felt like 5% when walking around and meeting people.) The excellent infrastructure and the


high levels of customer service in Singa- pore must also have contributed behind the scenes to a good event. Everything worked well and people did their jobs efficiently and without drama. The next one is in Geneva, 26th to


29th September 2016, and IBS Intelli- gence will be reporting from this event. Sibos 2015 will be a hard act to


follow. Antony Peyton Read all the Sibos reports for free and in full at www.ibsintelligence.com


Running into a project over-run? IBS launches IBS Chat


IBS Intelligence has launched its IBS Chat Forum, a global platform to bring industry participants together on everything related to banking and financial services technology. Log on to www.ibsintelligence.com/ibschat and connect with peers across the globe now!


sibos 2015


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52