Lender eyes more digital clients
Digital is a very broad term. Even in (UBP), we don’t intend to remove our bricks-and-mortar branches
Better numbers, in terms of embarking more clients in the digital space, are expected for the year 2020, Union Bank of the Philippines (UBP) Chief Technology Officer and Chief Transformation Officer Henry Aguda said.
“Most of our (digital feats) are out there in the papers. We launched our application program interface (API) platform that allows fintechs (financial technology firms) to connect to us easily. We launched our digital branches, paperless, self-service and the (mobile) app is award-winning because a lot of our customers now are using it,” Aguda said.
“When we started, it was a hundred thousand (but) it recently hit a base of about half million users already in a span of two years. We’re seeing the trajectory that come April or May next year, we’ll reach 1 million (app users),” he quickly added.
According to him, the lender is focus oned onboarding as many customers as they can.
Also, the UBP executive clarified that being all-digital doesn’t mean the bank is going to eliminate the traditional aspects of banking such as their bricks-and-mortar branches which are still the primary preference of some clients.
“Digital is a very broad term. Even in (UBP), we don’t intend to remove our bricks-and-mortar branches. They complement each other. In fact, a lot of our customers who go to the branches also download our app,” Aguda explained.
“If you look at the recent circulars of the BSP (Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas), it encourages all banks to have a digital transformation journey because they need to move from paper to digital payments, to adopting QR (quick response) code to doing open banking,” he added.
The executive also said the bulk of their income still comes from traditional banking business although their digital initiatives, such as the Ark, their own version of a digital bank, is doing very well.
“It is still the traditional for running the business. Our CEO (chief executive officer) is saying we invested about P3 billion in terms of technology. We ended with 40 transformed branches (for 2019). Next year we might add 50 or so,” he said.
“We’ve been digital for three years already. We’re done with blockchain, API, etc. Next is we want to be the first bank to be ready for the fourth industrial revolution,” he added.