Hackathons - short-term programming events using data, APIs and analytics to solve real-world problems are great for team-building, recruitment, networking and experimenting. But there is a growing sense that they are also contributing to banking innovation. Here are my observations on the subject. Hackathons are a relatively cheap way to
Improving customer experience and reducing costs to serve at the same time sound contradictory objectives. Surely improving customer experience requires a larger investment in it? Yet in some instances, I believe it is possible to achieve both at the same time. Last year I wrote a couple of blog posts
Self-driving cars on our streets, Siri in our pockets, Alexa in the living room ... artificial intelligence and the machine-learning process behind it is already in use today. It is partly embedded in our everyday life, and partly still has a “wow” factor about it. For example, when we hear
A bank stress test is the analysis conducted under unfavorable economic scenarios designed to determine whether a bank has enough capital to withstand the impact of adverse developments. Especially in the years since the wake of the 2007-2008 financial crisis, it has been actively promoted by authorities and regulators as
For the third installment of this series I visited Marlies van Sonsbeek (CEO) and Andrew Hagens (Chief Innovation Officer) of Finaps in their beautiful office in the south of Amsterdam. Company Overview Finaps is a young innovative company founded at the end of 2010 by two former ABN-Amro colleagues. Not
If you have ever been to the tropics, you will know that when it rains, it really rains. Bucketloads of water can fall in a very short period of time. But in an equally short period of time, all the water (usually) simply drains away, thanks to advanced civil engineering.
For anyone engaged in analytical marketing, creating a 360-degree single customer view (SCV) is nudging the top of your ‘to do’ list. Why shouldn’t it be? Knowing a lot about your customers can never be a bad thing, surely? But is a holistic view really necessary? Before we go there,
In recent years, widespread use of sophisticated mathematical, statistical and deterministic models has allowed financial institutions to make strategic decisions with a new level of knowledge. At the same time, these models have led them towards additional needs: quantifying, measuring and managing model risk. On top of that, regulators have
In a previous blog, I wrote about the principle of “Progress, not perfection”, something I very much believe in and try to practice. This time I want to emphasize another principle which I believe can also be very powerful in business: “Disagree and Commit”. Credits to SAS leader Bob Messier
Organisations that are best at using analytics have moved on from simple process improvement to building new business models. The benefits are such that others are striving to join them. But the journey towards data-driven business models is not an easy one. A recent online discussion among SAS and partner
