What is Efigence’s mission statement?
In Efigence we believe in technology as a method to provide the most satisfactory internet banking customer experience. We design and implement banking platforms which are intended and favorably verified as the solution for the changing world of financial services. A world where the market is extremely competitive and bankers have to continually adjust their operations to future requirements.
Where are you headquartered?
We operate from Warsaw, Poland but in line with our expansion in the EMEA region we are ready to dynamically establish operations in other countries. A geographical location defined as a spot between London and Dubai circumstantially represents our present and future operations.
Who do you think will be the most influential figures (or companies) in Fintech, in 2015?
We will observe an apogee in mobile and payments revolution. Providers of winning innovations in these areas will be the stars of 2015. The authority of noted educators – authors such as Bret King or Chris Skinner of best selling books on innovation in banking – will not be diminished.
However, the direction of change in the banking world is similar to those we observed on other markets many years ago. The customer will be the most influential figure. The customer with multichannel access to information about products (banking is not rocket science anymore!), with a wide range to a competitive market (people choose banks not the other way around anymore!) and growing expectations regarding reliable technology and convenient user interfaces granting the best user experience.
What kind of year do you foresee for your company, and the industry as a whole?
In general I expect a lot of interesting projects on the market in 2015. All those financial institutions who suspended their investments in innovative platforms will finally run their projects to catch up with the competitors who were innovators from the very beginning. The most innovative market players will try to be ahead but the advantage of being first to market is not a long-lasting one. If you offer the most innovative product on the market, you ought to be sure, that there are lots of followers who will be motivated by your success. I believe that in 2015 both banks and fintech companies, which were not the most innovative in the last few years will reconstruct their offers and platforms to bring them up to date.
Efigence will be still concentrated on the development of its product portfolio, including internet banking platforms for the retail and SME segment, integrated with complementary tools like advanced personalfinance management apps and real time marketing platforms.
What are your key targets for 2015?
Simultaneously to development on our local market we are going to build a stronger international presence in the EMEA region.
What will be the most important opportunities for FinTech in 2015?
The first and easiest to identify trend is digitization of all of the processes yet to be digitized. The second trend is the ongoing focus on user experience in the multichannel banking environment, defined not only as a transactional platform but as a bundle of all complementary services, like virtual branches, advisory applications, predicting customers needs and goals, and loyalty programs which build the bond between the customer and financial services providers.
The third trend I’d like to mention is the trend connected with collecting and analyzing data by the banks. I wouldn’t name it Big Data, but the effective use of data held by the banks will be even more helpful in customer segmentation, risk management and personalized product offerings. Thanks to one-to-one communication platforms and real time marketing solutions, banks will stop burning their budgets on marketing campaigns. They could sell and upsell their products to people who really need their product at that specific moment.
In Efigence, while developing our products, we are preparing solutions to those three opportunities mentioned.
What are the key hurdles for growing your business this year?
We put a lot of effort to nurture our start-up-like innovation-oriented culture. That’s only an example of the challenges we have to face, since we are a fast growing company with an increasing number of specialists in our team. I think the hurdles for our business are not different to what any innovative company on the fintech market can expect.
What are your thoughts on the current state of fintech?
It is exciting to be a part of such a competitive industry, where the factor of success depends on your ability to merge cutting edge technology, innovative business models and seamless customer experience. It is true that the innovation bubble is huge, but in Efigence we know that we are at a turning point now and that this is only the beginning.
