Opencast Software, the independent tech consultancy, has appointed digital transformation heavyweight Jason Kay as Digital & Technology Services Director. Opencast Software specialises in developing end-to-end enterprise solutions for Government, financial services, health and social care and renewable energy sectors. 

Jason has over 25 years of experience in digital transformation and technology, with his expertise spanning both public and private sector organisations. Before joining Opencast, Jason held a number of senior leadership and executive roles, including CTO, CIO and CDIO, at companies such as Bupa, BP, Citizens Advice, the Home Office, NHS Choices, Benenden Health, and the Ministry of Defence.  

Most notably, Jason was enlisted by HMRC to head up and lead the creation of its flagship digital delivery centre in Newcastle, leading the vision for how HMRC should digitise its operations and enable customers to access services digitally. As part of this, he delivered a new modern agile digital capability that could not only deliver customer centric digital products and services, significantly changing how HMRC engaged with its customers, but also save millions of pounds in taxpayers money through operational efficiencies. He grew the centre from start-up of a very small team to 400 people in a year. Due to its success, the Newcastle Digital Centre became the blueprint for further delivery centres for HMRC in the UK, and the wider adoption of Government Digital Services. 

This strategic hire for Opencast forms part of the organisation’s ambitious growth plans, which include employing 300 people by the end of 2025. As part of this, the firm will be looking to increase its presence in the Government services arena. 

Jason Kay, Digital & Technology Services Director at Opencast, comments: “I have known the Opencast team for quite some time and have always been impressed by their approach to digital and technology transformation. The team are not only committed to delivering a great and innovative client service, but also to ensuring that technology can be used as a force for good to help society and the region’s tech community. Opencast has ambitious plans for the future, and I am pleased to be joining the team at such a pivotal time in its growth.” 

Tom Lawson, CEO at Opencast Software, said: “Hiring someone of Jason’s calibre will enable us to build upon the success we’ve experienced over the last few years and in 2020 in particular. At Opencast, we are committed to hiring the best talent and ensuring that our existing team members have the chance to learn from some of the industry’s most experienced people. We want to be a place where technology specialists can thrive, where clients return because our approach gets results, and where our collaborative approach to technology services is clear to see.” 

Appsian, the global leader in Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) data security and compliance, today announced their security and compliance analytics platform, Appsian360, will feature support for Oracle E-Business Suite (Oracle EBS). Appsian360 will provide Oracle EBS customers with the ability to gain deep insight into who is accessing business data – when, how, and why. This insight closes a critical visibility gap that can leave organizations exposed to security and compliance threats.

As a 10-year Oracle partner with more than 250 customers worldwide, Appsian is the recognized data security leader for organizations across all verticals, including healthcare, higher education, public sector, manufacturing, and retail. Providing support for Oracle EBS, especially when workforces have been forced to be remote due to COVID-19, adds significant value to the Oracle security market.

"When Oracle EBS customers enable remote access, they need to ensure their data remains secure, yet accessible so business processes are not restricted," said Piyush Pandey, Appsian CEO. "Unfortunately, hackers and malicious insiders are compromising data and business processes at an increased rate because they know that no one is really watching the activity around data. Currently, Oracle EBS customers lack the granular visibility to easily discern normal employee activity from malicious activity, which leads to significant financial losses each year."

"What makes Appsian360 so unique is that it provides actionable insights into who is doing what, where, and why - at a granular level," added Pandey. "Activity logs are only as useful as the insights they provide, and Appsian360 enriches Oracle EBS logs with the valuable context, aggregation, and visualization required to enable a rapid response to a threat."

Originally released in 2018, Appsian360 was designed to provide visibility for PeopleSoft and SAP ERP customers. Realizing that data access and usage insights had significant value across multiple functions, Appsian has spent the last two years strengthening current functionality, along with expanding the offering to other ERP platforms like Oracle EBS.

"Appsian360 was designed to give leaders across multiple functions, like IT, security, auditing, and various lines of business, rapid, actionable insight into how their data is being accessed," said Greg Wendt, Executive Director of Security Solutions at Appsian. "We pride ourselves on being able to address a very serious problem that was largely going ignored for the broader ERP market. Everyone knows data access and usage information was largely a mystery – we're pleased to shed light on an otherwise dark area for security and compliance leaders."

Join Appsian for an exclusive demonstration, specifically for Oracle EBS customers, on Wednesday, December 9.

You can register here: https://www.appsian.com/dec-oracle-ebs.

Lu International (Singapore) Financial Asset Exchange Pte. Ltd. ("Lu International"), a subsidiary of China's leading technology-empowered personal financial services platform Lufax Holding, and KASIKORNBANK, leader in digital banking and one of Thailand's largest banks, announced today the launch of FinVest, an online wealth management platform. The new digital investment platform is aimed to help retail investors in Thailand gain access to a full spectrum of onshore and offshore investment products at a low minimum investment amount through the extensive network and relationships brought by Lu International, and the local expertise offered by KASIKORNBANK.

FinVest aims to provide personalised investment solutions for retail investors. The online investment platform that has been built in partnership between Lu International and KASIKORNBANK caters to digitally savvy investors, providing access to more than 600 funds from 15 Asset Management Companies in Thailand.

"Thailand is one of the fastest growing markets in Southeast Asia and continues to see rapid wealth growth and economic development," said Greg Gibb, CEO of Lufax Holding. "Partnerships and the sharing of technology know-how are defining the financial industry across the region, making significant improvements to the quality of service and offerings to clients. Through the collective capabilities of Lu International and KASIKORNBANK, investors now have access to international investment opportunities that have previously only been available to a select few."

Additionally, FinVest offers a curated client experience, including an enhanced design as well as user-friendly and mobile-friendly screen flows. In designing the mobile app, Lu International and KASIKORNBANK prioritise the needs of retail investors. These include the ability to make informed investment decisions and the access to relevant investment knowledge provided by Lu International and KASIKORNBANK in collaboration with Robowealth, a wealth-tech and investment specialist and investment solutions provider in Thailand. The ultimate goal of this collaboration is to make sure of the best investment journey to all investors.

Kit Wong, CEO of Lu International, commented: "Digital technology is rapidly changing the way investors use financial services. They are increasingly using digital channels to purchase financial products and invest. FinVest offers clients the convenience, efficiency, intelligence, and ease of use through a personalised online wealth management platform that will help Thailand and its economy stay at the forefront of the digital financial revolution taking place across the region."

Mr. Patchara Samalapa, KASIKORNBANK President, said: "In 2020, Thailand's total outstanding capital market value is worth around 44 trillion baht. Of this amount, investment in mutual funds totals 4.8 trillion baht or around 10 percent. Of late, the younger generation has shown increasing interest in mutual funds, preferring to conduct transactions via digital channels and seeking products related to Thai and foreign equity instruments. Moreover, open-architecture investment is growing every year. Development of the FinVest digital platform will help enhance investment potential for Thai retail investors, allowing them to directly invest in global mutual funds via FinVest." 

"FinVest marks a cooperative effort towards digital technology development; KASIKORNBANK, which has extensive digital banking expertise; Lu International -- a Singapore-based company under Lufax Holding, which is an associate of Ping An Group -- a large Chinese company with a team of world-class experts well-versed in investment technology; and Robowealth Mutual Fund Brokerage Securities Co., Ltd., an expert in wealth tech, ensuring that the FinVest platform is in alignment with the Thai capital market under the supervision of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Thailand. This cooperation also reinforces KASIKORNBANK's status as a complete banking service provider, based on a combination of its own digital banking expertise and that of the world's leading partners and fintech experts, to ensure that KASIKORNBANK is everywhere around you."

FinVest seamlessly caters to local investors with round-the-clock digital access to comprehensive information about their accounts, market insights and intelligence relevant to their portfolio, while opening the door to premium onshore and offshore wealth management products with an approximate minimum investment amount of US$35 / THB1, 000 with no additional account opening or closing fees. The platform also adopts strict Know Your Product (KYP) and Know Your Customer (KYC) compliance procedures, alongside an Anti-Money Laundering (AML) and an anti-fraud system, to meet regulatory requirements.

Lu International continues to strengthen its network via strategic partnership in collaboration with local financial institutions leveraging its technology and industry know-how across Southeast Asia as part of its expansion to capitalise on wealth management digitization and growth opportunities for financial services in some of the world's up and coming economies..

Finvest is available on Apple Store, Google Play Store and Huawei App Gallery. For more information, please visit www.finvest.co.th.

Thakral One today announces that it is extending its relationship with additiv and Microsoft as they seek to expand their focus within the Philippines and support banks access an underserved market.

additiv, a leading SaaS provider to the wealth management industry, and Thakral One, an IT consulting services focused on bringing global transformative technologies to the Philippines have joined forces locally, to enable banks to implement a fully digital wealth solution built on Microsoft Azure. The integration means that now banks within the country can provide an optimum customer experience at a lower cost with local support, while also potentially accessing an untapped opportunity in under three months through additiv Hybrid Wealth and Wealth Robo solutions using their KickStarter™ model.

The integration comes at a time when banks within the region need it most. Digitization has gradually impacted the wealth management industry, but as a result of the current pandemic, the speed of change has suddenly accelerated. Customers are demanding the best possible digital experience all while the industry needs to reduce costs.

In addition, there is a growing need within the region to meet the needs of the 15% of Filipinos with investible income who do not currently have access to investment products. This growing market is highlighted by the World Economic Forum who confirmed within a recent report that the middles-class population is expected to expand “to include 70% of the ASEAN population by 2030, total consumption will double across the region, with the Philippines experiencing the highest consumption growth.“

The collaboration allows financial institutions to access this market, through additiv’s Wealth Robo Accumulator solution on Azure and implemented with partners Thakral One. The solution integrates several Azure services including Azure Cache for Redis and a SQL Database. This offers a simple, transparent, and affordable digital tech solution for financial institutions in the Philippines to empower a greater number of discretionary and advisory clients to make considered, yet low value investments, easily based on automatically customized or remote personal advice tools.

Kevin Hardy, General Manager Asia Pacific at additiv, highlighted: “In these uncertain times, collaboration is key to success. And we cannot stand still. This collaboration allows banks within the Philippines finally to leverage the benefits of having a truly digital investment range with all the benefits of our KickStarter™ model with no integration, capex or implementation fees, delivered in under three months.“

Kevin Hardy added: “By offering efficient, engaging customer experiences at every touch-point at anytime, from anywhere, banks can now both service their existing client base but also more cost-effectively access additional markets previously not viable through self-service and personal advisory services.“

Ms. Melissa Egasani, SVP and Country Head for Philippines at Thakral One, confirmed: “Our team is quite experienced in the areas of Customer Intelligence, Analytics and Digital Process Automation and our Microsoft expertise along with keen focus on Financial Services Domain allows us to be the glue that completes the Additiv and Microsoft proposition in terms of probability of success for implementation in the Philippines.“

Fides Ricasa, One Commercial Partner Director at Microsoft Philippines, said: “It has never been more important for financial institutions to be able to efficiently offer solutions that support financial inclusion to the masses. Azure enabled Additiv to create the underlying DFS® Cloud Architecture. As a result, additiv and Thakral One client’s can experience the highest level of speed, flexibility, scale and security that they have come to expect from Azure."

The collaboration is an extension for both additiv and Thakral One. In June this year, additiv announced that their wealth KickStarter™ solutions are now available on Microsoft AppSource  for Web Apps.

SnapLogic, provider of the #1 Intelligent Integration Platform, announced that Siemens Digital Industries, an innovation and technology leader in industrial automation and digitalization, is using SnapLogic’s leading integration platform to connect its data management systems and provide over 80 regional sales teams with product master data in real-time.

Master data is crucially important to Siemens and its sales teams. But as the volume of data at Siemens grew, the IT team decided to review how to manage the growing demand for existing applications more efficiently. In this context, Siemens Digital Industries deployed SnapLogic’s Intelligent Integration platform in combination with Kafka data streaming service to revolutionize their data approach.

Today, the SnapLogic platform integrates product master data with a number of enterprise applications and supports a range of business processes within Siemens. This includes support for real-time quotation generation to the delivery of critical product data to sales teams exactly when they need it. The Siemens Digital Industries team has benefited from the SnapLogic platform's self-service capabilities, enabling a wide range of business users to contribute meaningfully to data initiatives. This now helps them to develop, manage, and improve data projects in a fraction of the time it took previously and with a much greater degree of agility.

“When we realized that our current data infrastructure was becoming exceedingly challenged by increasing data volumes, we knew we needed to invest in a cloud-based iPaaS solution which would be able to connect to the wide range of applications and systems we use at Siemens,” said Thomas Hecht, IT Project Lead at Siemens Digital Industries. “The ease of use, rich functionality, and fast time to value provided by the SnapLogic platform was exactly what we needed. After a successful pilot, we’ve seen some really encouraging results and are looking forward to seeing what comes next.”

Craig Stewart, CTO at SnapLogic, added: “We’re happy to be supporting another branch of the Siemens family, empowering them to integrate data faster than ever before. We are proud to support the Siemens Digital Industries sales teams by providing them with accurate and up-to-date data, whenever and wherever they need it. Looking ahead, we’re excited to build on this successful initiative to further help Siemens achieve their enterprise-wide digitalization goals.”

SnapLogic’s Intelligent Integration Platform uses AI-powered workflows to automate all stages of IT integration projects – design, development, deployment, and maintenance – whether on-premises, in the cloud, or in hybrid environments. The platform’s easy-to-use, self-service interface enables both expert and citizen integrators to manage all application integration, data integration, API management, B2B integration, and data engineering projects on a single, scalable platform.

Omdia – formerly Ovum – has named Temenos Infinity as a market leader in its new report “Omdia Universe – Selecting a Digital banking Platform 20/21”.

Omdia states that an optimized digital banking experience is integral to the future success, or even survival of a bank. The report:

• Gives Temenos Infinity top scores for product experience and solution innovation.
• Names Temenos Infinity as a market-leading digital platform based on its combination of market impact, solution capabilities, and customer experience.
• Shows the strength of Temenos’ market presence. Temenos Infinity is used by over 650 banks helping them transform customer experience and increase digital revenues by up to 5x.

Read the Omdia report today and discover why Temenos – and Temenos Infinity – is the standout choice for digital banking.

Tink today announces it has closed the year with a completed €85 million investment round extension, following its €90 million investment round in January. This brings the total invested in Tink during 2020 to €175 million.  

This funding top up will fuel Tink’s continued expansion and support the further development of its payment initiation technology, enabling companies of all shapes and sizes across Europe to integrate streamlined, low-cost payment solutions.

Today, Tink processes close to 1 million payment transactions per month in five markets, for clients including digital mailbox provider Kivra, used by close to 4 million adults in Sweden, and payment fintech Lydia, used by more than 5 million customers in France. Tink aims to make its payment initiation services live in 10 markets in 2021.

Through one API, Tink allows customers to access aggregated financial data, initiate payments, enrich transactions and build personal finance management tools. Tink’s technology and connectivity powers digital services for over 300 world-leading banks and fintechs – including PayPal, NatWest, ABN AMRO, BNP Paribas, Nordea and SEB – and is also used by more than 8,000 developers. Tink has an annual recurring revenue (ARR) of €30 million.

During 2020 Tink made three major acquisitions, as part of its strategy to invest in intelligent data-services based on open banking. Tink acquired Swedish credit decisioning firm Instantor, giving Tink increased capability in credit risk products built on top of its open banking connectivity, Spanish account aggregation provider Eurobits, significantly increasing Tink’s bank connectivity in Europe, and the aggregation platform of UK open banking pioneer, OpenWrks, which will bring UK business account data to Tink’s customers.

Tink is currently live in Sweden, UK, France, Spain, Germany, Italy, Portugal, Denmark, Finland, Norway, Belgium, Austria and the Netherlands. Founded in 2012 and headquartered in Stockholm, Tink has more than 350 employees and is currently serving its clients out of 13 local offices across Europe.

The investment round was co-led by a new investor, European growth equity player Eurazeo Growth, and current investor, London-based B2B software venture capital firm Dawn Capital. Existing investors PayPal Ventures, HMI Capital, Heartcore, ABN AMRO Ventures, Poste Italiane and BNP Paribas’ venture arm, Opera Tech Ventures, increased their investments in Tink. 

Daniel Kjellén, co-founder and CEO of Tink, said: “Despite the difficulties of 2020, it was a year of great growth for Tink. We significantly built out our bank connections across Europe, increasing coverage from 2,500 to 3,400 banks, and now serve more than 300 world-leading financial institutions. We also doubled the fintech users on our platform to 8,000 and increased employees from 250 to 365, in 13 offices across Europe.

“2020 has seen payments powered by open banking take-off, and in 2021 we expect to see this scale – most prominently in the UK, followed by Europe. This funding extension will further facilitate the development of our payment initiation services across Europe, while continuing to deliver new data-products built on open banking technology to our customers.”

Zoé Fabian, Managing Director of Eurazeo Growth, added: “The open banking movement continues to pick up pace, with 2021 showing every sign that it will bring increased collaboration between fintechs and large enterprises, who want to take digitally enabled services to their customers with a tried and trusted partner. Since its inception eight years ago, Tink has proven itself to be the leading open banking platform in Europe, and our investment underlines the confidence we and the industry have in Tink and open banking. We look forward to supporting them on their continued journey.”

Josh Bell, General Partner of Dawn, said: “Tink has truly emerged as Europe's leading open banking platform and is quickly becoming a key strategic piece of financial technology infrastructure. We have seen activity across Tink's network rapidly accelerate this year, with increasing adoption and implementation of open banking products and services across their platform. We are delighted to support Tink’s latest funding round, and look forward to working with the team across 2021 to expand the breadth and depth of its already considerable network of banks, accelerate the rollout of its account-to-account payments initiation solutions, and continue to deliver exceptional value to its fast-growing customer base.”

Synechron Inc., a leading Digital Transformation consulting firm for the financial services industry, today announced the acquisition of Attra, an Australia-based technology services and solutions provider, headquartered in Melbourne, and focused on the banking, finance, and payments industries. Attra is one of the leading pure play payments solutions providers with a global delivery footprint in Australia, New Zealand, North America, Europe, the Middle East, and APAC. It has development centers in Melbourne, Australia; Dubai, UAE; and Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Pune, India.

Founded in 1995, Attra brings Synechron 25 years of deep domain expertise in providing consulting, application development & maintenance, and quality engineering services to clients worldwide, across the payments value chain. Attra’s comprehensive cards and payments services complement the digital, consulting, and technology services that Synechron currently provides for its clients. Attra’s core offerings span the entire software lifecycle, with end-to-end offerings across four key industry verticals – FI and Payment Companies, Third-party Payment Processors and Payment Gateways, Retailers, and Next-Generation Payments. Synechron will further strengthen its technology capabilities through the addition of Attra’s core technology horizontals focused on Payment & Banking Platforms; Intelligent Automation; IT Infrastructure & Cloud; UI/UX, Mobility & Channels; and Information Management.

Post-acquisition, Attra will retain its brand identity but become a Synechron company. Attra’s global team of around 2,000 technology experts in the banking and payments domains will add to Synechron’s already vast pool of talent. Synechron’s and Attra’s combined global footprint will enable both to further expand its geographic span. This alignment will also enable the co-development of future-looking innovative solutions, both through Synechron’s 13 award-winning global Financial Innovation Labs (FinLabs) and Attra Labs, which prides itself on enabling the future now, by engineering payment solutions and creating tools and processes that shape the evolution of technology.

Terms of the deal have not been disclosed. Avendus Capital is Attra’s financial advisor on this transaction.

Faisal Husain, Co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Synechron, explained: “We provide our clients with a comprehensive set of digital transformation capabilities and the acquisition of Attra enables us to strengthen our service offerings. Moving forward, our combined workforce will top 10,000 employees and annual revenue of $650M+. The enhanced competencies that Attra brings will allow us to further advance our clients’ banking & digital payment technology services while ensuring regulatory compliance.” He added, “Attra’s end-to-end payments technology services will blend nicely with our digital innovation that is at the very core of Synechron’s DNA. We welcome the Attra team into the Synechron family.”

Chris van Buuren, CEO of Attra, commented: “The payments industry is experiencing a full-fledged digital transformation that is being fueled by exciting new technology advancements and regulatory and competitive changes. We are very excited to join with the passionate team at Synechron as we continue our mission to be strategic partners with organizations in the financial services industry and empower them with a full suite of digitally-led technology services and solutions in payments.”  

This acquisition of Attra marks the second acquisition Synechron has closed in the past six weeks. On October 23, Synechron announced its acquisition of Citihub Digital, a London and New York-based technology consulting firm for the financial services industry. Citihub Digital brought Synechron expert competencies on application modernization, cloud enablement, cybersecurity and operating model transformation. Both acquisitions renew Synechron’s deep commitment to partner with top-notch digital transformation companies and their domain experts in accelerating digital for the entire financial services ecosystem across the globe.

IHS Markit, a world leader in critical information, analytics and expertise, today announced that capital markets veteran Seiichiro Miyaoka has joined the firm as Managing Director and APAC Head of the Global Markets Group (GMG). 

In this newly created Tokyo-based role, Miyaoka will collaborate with the GMG regional commercial and technology leadership teams to reinforce IHS Markit’s commitment as a value-added partner to capital markets. Miyaoka will also engage the firm’s APAC clients to drive scalable innovation and enhanced capabilities in the region.  

With more than 30 years of capital markets expertise in APAC debt and equity markets, Miyaoka brings robust knowledge of IHS Markit’s global buyside and sellside client base, driven by on-the-ground experience in Hong Kong, Tokyo, Singapore and London. Miyaoka joined IHS Markit from Mizuho Securities, where he engaged both in primary and secondary business.

Prior to his role at Mizuho Securities, Miyaoka served in roles at Nomura and UBS. 

Commenting on the recruitment, Chris Sztam, Global Head of GMG, said: “I’m thrilled to have Seiichiro join IHS Markit as we continue expanding our footprint across the APAC region. He will work closely with myself and other senior leaders to drive a growth strategy that provides an enhanced level of service to our clients.” 

“We are simultaneously investing in best-in-class technology, products and talent to deliver clients greater value. With Seiichiro on board to lead our path forward in APAC, the team is well-positioned to broaden our impact in the new year and beyond,” concluded Sztam. 

Throughout 2020, GMG has strongly transformed to meet the rapidly-evolving needs of global financial institutions. These efforts include a variety of collaborative, operational and strategic moves that seamlessly position GMG capabilities within the broader set of offerings available from IHS Markit.

Research has indicated that mortgage borrowers may prefer a wealth-like ongoing service plan from brokers. The Mortgage Insights 20/21 research, conducted by eKeeper’s parent company, DPR Group, incorporated more than 2,000 responses from mortgage consumers, brokers and lenders. It explores the challenges faced by the different respondents to provide a unique insight into the current state of the mortgage market.

When questioned about on-going service after a mortgage had been arranged, 60% of mortgage consumers expected brokers to proactively inform them when they were coming to their deal end period; what’s more 49% were looking for better deals from their broker.  Other aspects of on-going service saw 35% expecting regular annual reviews followed by 26% wanting regular communication.

However, the survey also revealed that this is easier said than done for some brokers. 37% of brokers say that they have no technology solution in place to enable them to communicate regularly and easily with their customers and 62% of those brokers have no plans to source such a solution.  This contrasts with the remaining 63% with a solution in place, with two thirds reporting that they had effectively retained over 60% of existing business through the use of such technology.

David Bennett, commercial director of eKeeper, commented: “It will always be customers that dictate the level of interaction and engagement they want from any business. Our research certainly highlights the desire from a good proportion of mortgage customers for a post-sale relationship like those employed by financial advisers.  Of course, engaging with customers prior to the deal end date is simply a necessity for any mortgage and protection intermediary to preserve that relationship and continue to demonstrate value. It will also help to keep the relationship with the customer, which should enable additional protection sales and prevent the customer going straight to the lender for an automatic product transfer.”

He continues: “Within the eKeeper CRM systems, retention tooling is an integral functionality which ensures that leads and diarised reminders are automatically generated.  However, it is concerning from both a commercial and servicing perspective, that a third of brokers do not use any technology for retention and a large amount have no intention of implementing such tools.”