Finacle's 'Bank In A Box' Approach Enables Faster Time-To-Market

In an exclusive interaction with Biztech2.com, Haragopal M, Global Head – Finacle - Infosys Technologies, talks about the USP of the company’s flagship Core banking Solution (CBS) from a Regional Rural Bank (RRB) perspective. He also shares some R&D for the latest version of Finacle.

The RBI directive to banks for adopting CBS by Sep 2011 is the major driver for Finacle uptake in the RRB space. How will you differentiate Finacle from other competition?

Finacle is completely a web-enabled CBS, covering deposits, lending services and customer information. It provides lower cost of ownership for the banks and also supports RRB specific functionalities such as subsidy, statutory and operational reporting related to RRBs. As many as 13 RRBs have finished implementing this last year itself.

Finacle is uniquely positioned to offer the right solution for RRBs because it helps banks consolidate on one platform, if Finacle is also used by the sponsored bank. It is a ‘Bank in a Box’ approach with specific focus on products and services used by rural banks, which helps them go live within a very short span of time, thus resulting in faster time to market.

From an RRB CIO perspective, how would you assure him/her of effective service delivery at low price points?

Financial inclusion, on the one hand is about expanding and achieving growth from a bank’s perspective. On the other hand, it is making sure that the products and services are made affordable, accessible, simple and convenient for the end customers of the bank. The product definition and channels used by an RRB need to be different. The use of self-service kiosks, mobile banking and other alternate banking channels, can help in extending the reach of the financial system with relatively lower investments in physical and technology infrastructure. The economies of scale will provide a sustainable business model to counter the low transaction values.

Banks also have to partner and collaborate with business correspondents in many areas for them to reduce their costs and deliver products and services effectively and efficiently.

What’s happening on the R&D front for the latest Finacle version?

At Finacle, innovation is part of the organisational DNA that runs through the whole product life cycle. There are multiple things that are being researched and tested for Finacle in general, which will also be used for RRBs. These include- Process Orientation to improve productivity and efficiency at branches; User Experience improvement to cater to latest changes in the accessibility and usability guidelines issued from a compliance perspective; Social commerce and social networking-its impact on banking and customers; And Using new age technology to provide low cost hi-tech channels like kiosks for customer convenience.