Leading fintech figures pool knowledge at UAE Banking & Finance Congress

International Data Corporation (IDC) has hosted its inaugural UAE Banking & Finance Congress at the Jumeirah Creekside Hotel in Dubai.

The event brought together a panel of BFSI industry leaders and champions to present best-practice strategies for going beyond digital and taking the customer experience to new heights. The event featured interactive presentations from senior executives of Emirates NBD, National Bank of Fujairah, Al Hilal Bank, Commercial Bank of Dubai, RAKBANK, United Bank Limited, Union Insurance Company, DGCX, and First Gulf Bank.

"Customer expectations are changing and traditional customer service is often regarded as unappealing these days, leading to poor customer experiences," says Jyoti Lalchandani, IDC's Group Vice President and Regional Managing Director for the Middle East, Africa, and Turkey. "This change is driven by a new generation of customers who are demanding better, personalized, and increasingly remote services, which in turn is prompting the need for organizations to provide timely and relevant information to client-facing units across multiple channels."

The event explored this evolution in customer demand in greater detail, offering advice on what it takes to triumph in the battle to provide the best customer experience. IDC also introduced its new digital transformation model called 'Leading in 3D', which is focused on providing the tools required to drive operational excellence in retail and corporate banking.

This intense focus on embracing the power of digital technology formed the backdrop to the IDC UAE Banking & Finance Congress 2016, and the event's high-quality, content-driven agenda leveraged IDC Financial Insights' extensive end-user research on the subject. This was complemented by the thoughts of widely respected public sector experts on emerging issues such as transforming customer experiences to drive growth, leveraging blockchain technology within the financial industry, and future proofing IT infrastructure.

"Over the last nine months, blockchain technology has been a much touted branch of science that is poised to change the entire financial landscape," says Thomas Zink, Associate Research Director, Financial Insights, IDC Central Europe. "However, its true capabilities and potential can easily be misunderstood. As such, our aim during this event was to explain how blockchain technology can be used to improve efficiency while reducing the cost of operations and serving as an enhanced, tamper-evident ledger solution that will form a major part of future banking systems."

IDC experts were joined by leading technology vendors at the event, including Hitachi Data Systems (Premium Partner), Misys (Workshop Partner), Vision Solutions (Exhibit Partner), Western Digital (Raffle Partner), and Oxford Business Group and Business Islamica (Media Partners).

Follow @BusinessRevME

Read the December 2016 issue of Business Review Middle East magazine