Chief Information Officer, G P Parsik Sahakari Bank Ltd
Technology is going to drive the banking sector in near future and self intuitive services will be at the forefront. G P Parsik Sahakari Bank Ltd is planning its services in alignment with this trend, deploying tech-driven innovation for all its consumers both from urban and rural areas, says Manoj Gadkari, Chief Information Officer, G P Parsik Sahakari Bank Ltd, in conversation with Harshal Yashwant Desai of Elets News Network (ENN).
What are the upcoming tech-driven innovations planned by G P Parsik Sahakari Bank (multi-State scheduled bank), apart from its traditional offerings?
We are planning to develop technology platform which can enable us to deliver banking services such as money transfer facility and micro ATM in rural areas where there is poor connectivity. Further, we are also in process of upgrading our core banking applications. We have consolidated our datacentre by server virtualisation and optimised the power consumption up to 70 per cent by datacentre precision cooling systems. We are evaluating Near Field Communication (NFC) debit cards.
Your bank is expected to reach a total number of 101 branches and business of 10,000 crore by 2020. What new States are you adding into your operations?
We have started our operations in Goa and Karnataka and our focus will be on expanding more branches across these States.
Majority of the Indian population resides in the rural areas. What measures do you take to promote financial inclusion in those areas?
Banking services need to reach unbanked areas of rural India. We already have good number of branches in rural areas. We are also planning to reach internal parts of rural area with our Business Correspondence (BC) model. In collaboration with our fintech partner, we will enable technology platform for BC that will help them with services such as money transfer via Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (AePS), open account with the help of eKYC and distribute Rupay debit card without any charges.
In the age of technological innovations, how do you cope up with safety threats?
We have implemented cyber security framework in our existing information security policy. We have 24×7 Security Operations Center (SOC) monitoring and Security Information Event Management (SIEM) System in place. Besides, dynamic vulnerability assessment (VA) and penetrative testing (PT) are part of regular security exercise. Regular system audit and gap analysis help us remain informed about the state of our information security and internet facing infrastructure.
What are your plans for future interventions?
India will be a country of youngsters by 2020 as the average age of Indians will be of 29 years. Our focus will be to attract younger customers in the 25-35 age group. To deliver frictionless banking, we are deploying technology which can enable self intuitive account opening and register for various delivery channels offer by the bank without visiting branch. Chatbots for customers’ assistance and analytics will be used to analyse customer behaviour to pitch right products.
Real-time recommendations will become reality. Big Data and sophisticated analytics have transformed how banks mine and understand customer data. To leverage huge data with advancements in artificial intelligence and machine learning, we want to be equipped to provide predictive personalisation, from tailored products and services for anticipated life events, such as a mortgage or a child’s university education, to real-time recommendations and financial advice.
