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Banking software firm expands in Nigeria

By on March 17, 2015

The CR2, an international firm that assists banks to reduce costs and increase revenues through the use of self-service channels, said it has expanded its operations in Nigeria.

The firm said the move was spurred by the ongoing drive for cashless policy in Nigeria as well as the huge opportunities in the Nigerian market.

Chief Operating Officer, CR2, Mr. Mike Brady, stated this while briefing the media in Lagos recently.

CR2 has been in business for over 25 years. It has over
100 banks as customers, spread across 60 countries. Its number one market is Africa and 60 per cent of its
revenue comes from Africa.

Brady said the firm has been in Nigeria for 10 years and has been working with Diamond Bank. he said Nigeria remains a very dynamic market for CR2 as banking customers continue to embrace innovative and unique banking services

“We think the time is right for us to expand in Nigeria and we are doing that by working with Global Info Swift (GIS). We have started employing local employees,” he said.

According to him, his firm is a software company and sells its products specifically to banks. He stressed his firm’s banking solutions also help in reducing cost of transactions.

“There is a whole trend in the banking business to move towards self-service. The next big wave in terms of self-service is to enable the person from his home and office to do internet banking and the big trend over the next number of years is mobile banking, we do mobile internet and also mobile apps. We also produce the software behind point of sale (PoS)

“So, ATMs, mobile banking, PoS, internet banking, are referred as channel banking. What we did with our omni channel banking is to put a channel manager, which is a piece of software in front of the core banking and through that we can do anything,” he explained.

Brady listed the reasons why he thinks Nigeria is good for CR2 to include the country’s growing market towards self-service, the drive by the central bank towards self-service.

“The banks need to differentiate themselves. Particularly, if you visit all the ATMs, that are not Diamond Bank, all the banks have same service providers and the screens are dull and old fashioned. But Diamond Bank ATMs are colourful and attractive,” he added.

On his part, the Managing Director, GIS, Mr. Solomon Edun, pointed out that banks are now in a situation whereby their multiple streams of earnings are disappearing and so they need to address such challenge.

“Now we see that the customers are now determining how the banks should respond to them as against the bank telling them what to do. The solution is in breaking down your cost of business and one way you can do it is by leveraging this sort of solution whereby from mobile banking, internet banking, ATMs and of course your Po, you can make payment.

“The partnership between GIS and CR2 is to bring two things to the market- help the banks bring down their cost and helping them create new channels of revenue,” he added.

 

[ThisDay]