What is equally if not more important, however, is the power of AI to help solve some of the world’s most challenging social problems. This resonates with the work we’re doing with Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services, where we strive to not only empower customers but also help improve the world broadly through responsible AI and cloud computing.

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It’s clear that generative AI opens new doors to create greater value for customers, the benefits of which are already dramatic across industries. In the unique case of financial services, generative AI also opens opportunities to address global problems that have long challenged almost every segment of society.

Three areas of financial services impact

In January, I had the opportunity to participate in the World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland. Naturally, AI was a big topic of conversation, and what was most encouraging to me were the discussions and examples of its potential to impact major social challenges. In the context of social good, I see three key areas where this can happen:

1. Equity and inclusion

I see advanced and generative AI holding tremendous potential to create more inclusive and personalized financial products and experiences for a broader population. This could include the latest natural language capabilities in chatbots, integrating screen reading and narration capabilities like Seeing AI into your banking products for the blind and low vision community, and offering speech-to-text functionality for those with hearing impairments. A powerful example of the transformative potential of AI in coding is the story of Anton Mirhorodchenko, a Ukrainian software developer living with cerebral palsy. By using GitHub Copilot, he dramatically simplified his workflow and improved his productivity and outlook.

2. Poverty and stability

Financial inclusion is also key to stability, as technological innovations unlock new opportunities for data-driven financial tools that can empower a broader range of underserved communities to achieve financial independence. There’s a lot of exciting fintech innovation in this area. For example, CWallet, a fintech company specializing in digital wallet services, is empowering migrant workers in Qatar to access financial services with Microsoft Azure. There are other important fintech initiatives underway in places like Latin America and Kenya using AI and digital innovations to improve lives, reduce poverty, expand access to financial services and credit, and narrow the financial inclusion gap.

And it’s exciting to see how other organizations across industries are already innovating with Azure OpenAI Service to enable inclusive growth with technology. For example, as part of our new ADVANTA(I)GE INDIA initiative and AI skilling efforts, Indian social impact organization, Karya, is using Azure OpenAI to help make technology accessible in under-resourced languages and to more inclusive data—with work that also provides rural citizens with training, fair wages, and education about financial tools to make best use of their earnings.

3. Environment

We all recognize the critical importance of addressing climate change, and this is already an important topic in financial services. But I believe we are just scratching the surface on AI’s potential to tackle common risks and opportunities for environmental, social, and governance (ESG) and sustainability efforts in FSI due to slow manual processes, siloed data, data quality issues, lack of insights, and reporting. Generative AI advancements can aid in synthesizing structured and unstructured data, creating ESG insights and recommendations, and reporting out to stakeholders. I’m also excited to see examples from financial leaders like Emirates NBD transforming sustainability measurement capabilities with Microsoft Sustainability Manager.

When it comes to achieving these ambitions—and countless others where AI can make a major difference—success requires more than just cutting-edge technology. Microsoft believes that meaningful innovation can only happen when organizations also embrace a set of enabling principles that focus on ethics and human factors.

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The critical role of responsible AI

The excitement around this next wave of AI is undeniable, but we must wield it responsibly to avoid perpetuating biases or excluding segments of society. At Microsoft, we are committed to helping our customers use our AI products responsibly, sharing our learnings, and building trust-based partnerships.

To help financial services organizations realize AI’s potential, Microsoft has published the Responsible AI Standard, developed an Impact Assessments template, and created transparency documents for customers using our Azure OpenAI Service and products like the new Bing to share what we’ve learned. The Microsoft open-source Fairlearn toolkit can also help financial services organizations ensure their AI systems are equitable by identifying biases in data. When our partner EY put it to the test with real-world mortgage adjudication data, it improved the fairness of loan decisions, narrowing gender disparities from 7% to less than 0.5%. From Davos, you can also watch my panel discussion on the responsible deployment of AI in financial services.

How inclusive design and diversity unlock potential

Inclusive design hinges on the vast spectrum of human diversity, gleaning insights from varied perspectives. Microsoft champions design principles that recognize exclusion, learn from diversity, and create universally beneficial solutions. Technology that is designed in this way means better access, less friction, and greater emotional connection with more people.

Our commitment to helping others shift to inclusive solutions is found in our Microsoft Inclusive Design toolkit. The tools create large-scale solutions, such as digital experiences that are more responsive and less biased, and cities that are more accessible. In the financial sector, this translates into products and services designed to meet the needs of as many individuals as possible, regardless of their abilities or circumstances.

Likewise, diversity is a proven catalyst for innovation among technology teams. Studies show that greater diversity can help teams focus more on facts, process those facts more carefully, and generate more creativity and innovation.¹ Ethnically and gender-diverse management teams are more likely to financially outperform in their industry, and companies with more women in leadership positions tend to be more profitable.² So, for technology to be truly inclusive, it needs to be built by teams that reflect the diversity of its users.

A mission of empowerment through AI

My transition from the banking industry to Microsoft was driven by the potential for meaningful technological innovation that could create a positive change. Despite the challenges we face, my outlook remains optimistic. I hope this blog has set some ideas in motion for you, and I invite everyone to become involved in efforts to use AI in ways that benefit society broadly.

The Microsoft mission is to empower every individual and organization on the planet to achieve more, and we do that by building technology that we believe will change the world. To accomplish that, we know that we must embrace a set of important responsibilities. Trust, reliability, safety, privacy, security, inclusiveness, transparency, and accountability—these are the foundational principles that have guided our leadership in AI over the past decade. Along with our partners and many other global stakeholders, we invite you to join us on the important journey ahead.

To learn more about our commitment to trustworthy AI and to find further resources, please visit our Empowering responsible AI practices website.

¹Diversity wins. How inclusion matters. McKinsey & Company, May 2020.

²Why Diverse Teams Are Smarter. David Rock and Heidi Grant, Harvard Business Review, Nov 4, 2016.

The post AI for social impact: 3 ways financial services can influence global challenges appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.

From the start, financial services organizations responded positively to our cloud offering, which is designed to help them unlock business value and deepen customer relationships. Built on the broad and integrated capabilities of the Microsoft Cloud, we provide a unique set of industry-specific solutions, components, and AI models that are optimized to ease interoperability and unify data. Solutions built on our cloud have helped financial services organizations improve employee productivity, operational efficiency, and customer experience, all while maintaining security and compliance.

Customer interest soared after November 2022, when the era of generative AI began with OpenAI’s release of ChatGPT and, soon after, the availability of Azure OpenAI Service. And in the past six months, many of our customers have taken promising early steps to start harnessing the power of generative AI to transform their operations and value propositions. This will be central to our participation at Sibos.

Microsoft at Sibos: A focus on payments in the era of AI

Sibos is a key event that brings together industry executives, decision makers, and thought leaders to debate and collaborate on areas such as payments, securities, cash management, and trade. The theme at this year’s event, “Collaborative finance in a fragmented world,” resonates with the work we’re doing across the industry, as it touches on inclusion, risk management, sustainability, and the balance of technology and trust.

Our focus at Sibos was the future of payments in the era of AI. Beyond a complete set of sessions and presentations from experts across our business, we will demonstrate how the latest AI innovations of the Microsoft Cloud, together with solutions from our global partner community, can help commercial and corporate banking customers build new solutions and find new efficiencies.

Among our innovations, we demonstrated an integrated copilot experience for asset management as a new user journey across analytics, workplace services, and data intelligence. We also illustrated the power of AI with new workflow approaches that leverage Microsoft Teams, Microsoft Power BI, and our data solutions.

Partner innovation is central to our cloud

We were especially proud to showcase the contributions of our growing Microsoft partner ecosystem at Sibos. Our global partners comprise a unique community of leading technology providers who help banks, capital markets firms, insurance providers, investment firms, and other organizations efficiently engage as an ecosystem to create products and services, solve specific business problems, and achieve their business goals.

Our strategic partners build solutions on Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services that accelerate the delivery of value to customers. We partner with independent software vendors (ISVs) such as ASC Technologies, Backbase, Finastra, LSEG, Moody’s, and Symphony AI, as well as global systems integrators (GSIs) like Accenture/Avanade, EY, and PwC, to create, implement, and enhance solutions that are tailored to the unique needs and requirements of financial services organizations.

“Our LSEG-Microsoft partnership will innovate in a way that will have a significant impact, disrupt the status quo, and make a real difference to the way our financial services customers discover data, create models, make informed decisions, and create unique insights.”

—Satvinder Singh, Group Head of Data and Analytics, LSEG.

During the conference, there were exciting announcements regarding generative AI investments from Intellect Design and Trade Ledger that will provide deeper insights into our joint efforts.

Microsoft at Sibos 2023

• Matthew Kerner, Corporate Vice President, Microsoft, and Dmitri Sedov, Group Head, Data Intelligence, LSEG had a special session, “Unleashing Capital Markets Generative AI Insights.” They discussed their progress and vision for the future of global financial services solutions built on Microsoft Cloud and AI capabilities powered by LSEG data and analytics.
• The Sibos audience also heard from several Microsoft experts on topics such as the following:
  • Beyond the Buzzwords: Understanding the Reality of AI’s Reach—Jacqueline O’Flanagan, General Manager Financial Services, Microsoft Canada.
  • Instant Treasury: Everything, Everywhere, All at Once—Anita Mehra, Corporate Vice President, Global Treasury and Financial Services.
  • Cloud Sovereignty: Defining the Best Approach and Actions—Sean Foley, Chief Technology Officer Worldwide Financial Services.
  • Embracing ISO 20022: Assessing Opportunities and Overcoming Challenges for Third Parties, and Modernizing Correspondent Banking in a Fragmented World—Peter Hazou, Director of Business Strategy, Worldwide Financial Services.
  • Embracing Global Connectivity to Unlock the Future of Finance—Chris Barry, Corporate Vice President, Microsoft Canada.
• Finally, on the Microsoft booth, Microsoft’s Rosie Mastrandrea, Senior Director of Product Marketing, Regulated Industries, hosted the Women in FSI panel, featuring Microsoft executives Willayna Banner, Senior Director and Head of Web3/Blockchain, Banking, Insurance and Trust, and Karen Del Vescovo, Corporate Vice President, Financial Services, together with our partners Dubie Cunningham, Banking Group President, Zafin, and Kalliope Chioti, Chief Marketing and ESG Officer, Temenos.

Providing a foundation of trust for financial services

The wide range of solutions we shared at Sibos 2023 highlighted how Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services is generating new value for customers and deepening their customer relationships. Across this broad spectrum, customers are realizing specific benefits in these areas:

• Better customer experiences. Using tools, data, and AI to deliver more relevant and personalized interactions, infused with deeper client insights, which results in greater profitability and customer loyalty.
• Empowering employees. Using automation, collaboration, and communications to advance employee productivity, enhance process efficiencies, and alleviate administrative burden.
• Managing risk and compliance. Optimizing operational risk management with technology solutions and programmatic support to help deliver risk insights, comply with regulatory requirements, secure identities, and manage sensitive data against threats.
• Modernizing payments and core banking. Facilitating secure cloud migration of essential core systems and data without compromising control, compliance, or business continuity, which empowers customers to innovate while also reducing costs.
• Creating a sustainable future. Working to help meet environmental, social, and governance (ESG) standards with Microsoft Cloud benefits that both improve the bottom line and better support the planet.

On the horizon for Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services

Moving forward in the new era of AI, we will continue to build on our innovations and learnings, working with our financial services customers to identify and prioritize use cases, enable copilots and plugins for value-add experiences, and explore the new frontiers of generative AI and LLMs. We will continue to invest in flexibility and extensibility with Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services to enable a broader partner ecosystem.

It’s an amazing time to be involved in the financial services industry. Our commitment continues to be empowering our customers to deliver first-class customer experiences, transform their operations, and open new opportunities.

Stay tuned for upcoming blog posts that will explore the impact of generative AI in the financial services industry.

The post Microsoft at Sibos 2023: Showcasing Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.

In the financial services industry, there has been greatly heightened interest in AI and the transformative opportunities of this new wave of breakthroughs. With the industry’s focus on managing risk and generating returns, generative AI has the potential to drive marked improvements in employee productivity, operational efficiency, and customer experience. In my current conversations with customers and partners, I’m asked how Microsoft can help businesses and organizations get started on the journey. This is especially true in banking, where technology is playing an increasingly decisive role in addressing a broad range of financial, regulatory, and competitive challenges. Generative AI has added a whole new dimension to what we mean by intelligent banking and the possibilities it creates to unlock greater innovation and business value at an accelerated pace.

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What generative AI means for banking

As generative AI capabilities become available to everyone, banks and other institutions will want to build intelligent solutions to provide revolutionary new capabilities—first with their employees and, over time, for their customers. Microsoft will help enable this with Microsoft 365 Copilot, which we announced last month. Integrated across Microsoft 365, this copilot will provide generative AI capabilities to the entire Microsoft productivity suite.

For banks that want to rapidly apply intelligence to improve operations and drive efficiencies, they can apply for access to Azure OpenAI Service to accelerate the deployment of their use cases. Azure OpenAI Service brings together advanced models from OpenAI, including ChatGPT and GPT-4, with the enterprise capabilities of Azure. Critically for banks, it is deployed on their Azure tenants so that all data—including training data and content—stays within the bounds of their organizations. By being fully integrated into Azure, banks also get all the advantages of enterprise-grade security and role-based access included. You also get the benefit of building on the Microsoft Cloud platform where we are infusing AI into all our products, making it easier to integrate these new capabilities into your applications. And it’s only getting better, as we recently announced the availability of GPT-4 in a preview release. GPT-4 is OpenAI’s most advanced LLM, enabling you to drive insights with greater accuracy than previous LLMs developed by OpenAI.

Azure OpenAI Service lets you deploy large, pre-trained, foundational models developed by OpenAI. This means you can potentially transform important tasks such as:

• Writing assistance and content generation.
• Reasoning over structured and unstructured data.
• Summarization of reports and text.

Use cases in banking

As we engage with our customers, we are seeing powerful new use cases emerge. For any scenario, we believe human agency and supervision are critical to ensure that generative AI is empowering and enabling human creativity. In our own products, we enable this through our copilots. The copilot is there to support you and work under your direction, with the human in charge. For example, GitHub Copilot provides code suggestions for developers as they enter code right inside the developer environment. In other situations, a chat-based experience will be a better fit when you are looking to embed knowledge search capabilities or a search bar to accept a prompt to generate some new content. Key banking use cases where generative AI can have the greatest impact include:

• Empowering contact center agents. Generative AI enables you to summarize conversations and get insights across various conversations. Customer sentiment can be measured from the start to the end of the conversation. In addition to summarization, generative AI can provide coaching to contact center staff in real-time, and partially automate the customer journey with human supervision of the next step. It can also feed new intelligence into the contact center knowledge base to enable agents to respond faster to future questions. For all these capabilities, we can aggregate insights for tracking key performance indicators (KPIs) for customer satisfaction, engagement, and impact to the Net Promoter Score (NPS), all of which can be used to continuously improve the experience for customers.
• Empowering advisors. Financial products have extensive documentation that can be difficult to search, making it a challenge to get to an answer quickly. In some scenarios, advisors are certified in their product knowledge. Many banks are exploring the opportunity for generative AI to help advisors retrieve the answers they need from financial product documentation. Generative AI makes it easier to do this through powerful summarization and contextualization capabilities. It can even summarize the key attributes of products in a comparison table. In addition to advisory roles, these enhanced knowledge search capabilities can be built once and used by multiple roles across the bank such as branch staff and contact center agents.
• Content generation. Banks are exploring how generative AI can accelerate the development of content such as pitch books. Pitch books are used by investment banks to generate a proposal for a capital raise or merger and acquisition for an institutional investor. Pitch books are developed collaboratively with content from multiple sources such as an overview of the client, the deal strategy, and marketing materials. For every content generation scenario, human oversight is critical to ensure the quality and accuracy of generated content.
• Code generation. GitHub Copilot was released last year, and developers can now take advantage of generative AI to provide code suggestions for dozens of programming languages, access application programming interfaces (APIs) faster, and accelerate software development. In March 2023, we announced the upcoming GitHub Copilot X, which is trained on GPT-4 and brings AI capabilities to the entire development lifecycle.

Responsible AI by design

As next-generation AI innovation gains momentum, we are optimistic about what it can do for people, industry, and society. Microsoft’s advancements in AI are grounded in our company mission to help every person and organization on the planet to achieve more. We’re committed to making the promise of AI real—and doing it responsibly. Our approach to AI is based on three principles: meaningful innovation, empowering people and organizations, and responsibility.

Accordingly, we’re dedicated to the responsible development of AI systems for the industry, ensuring they will function as intended and be used in ways that earn trust. We were one of the first major technology companies to call for thoughtful government regulation on facial recognition technology and are committed to creating responsible AI by design through our Responsible AI standard. For more information, see “What is Microsoft’s Approach to AI?“.

What’s next

Empowering our customers with intelligent banking capabilities is core to our mission, and we are excited to bring generative AI innovations to them through our Azure OpenAI Service and our copilot offerings. Additionally, we will work with our industry partners to enable them to take advantage of these same capabilities in their own solutions. I look forward to seeing what our customers and partners will create with generative AI in partnership with us. Together, we can apply the world’s most advanced AI models to meet business imperatives responsibly, securely, and with the confidence that can only be achieved with Microsoft Cloud.

Stay tuned for upcoming blog posts that will explore the possibilities of generative AI in the insurance and capital markets segments along with more guidance on responsible AI. We’re excited to help the financial services industry embrace this new era of AI and accelerate transformation.

Finally, learn more about the era of generative AI across the financial services industry by reading other posts in this series:

• The era of generative AI: Driving transformation in insurance

The post The era of generative AI: Driving transformation in banking appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.

As a business and technology advisor to the financial services industry, we were proud to see so many of our financial services customers drive responsible growth strategies, using their digital foundations to find new and innovative ways to serve and create value for their customers in the current environment.

Looking ahead, I also see six key areas of prioritization in 2023: 

1. Cost take-out and doing more with less. In the face of continued volatility, how can financial services organizations digitize, automate, and better run their processes and operations more efficiently to save on costs and fund innovation? Doing more with less also means applying technology to amplify what institutions are able to do across their organizations so they can differentiate and build resilience.
2. Rethinking customer engagement. To compete in the current environment while transforming for the future, how do financial services organizations reshape their customer engagement and deliver experiences, products, and services that are consistent, contextual, personalized, and continuous across current and emerging channels?
3. Elevating employee experiences. As the future of work continues to evolve, how do financial services organizations create the experiences and culture that attract, energize, and retain talent? And how do they empower employees with the right tools and insights to improve productivity and efficiency, better collaborate, and deliver deeper, more meaningful customer engagement?
4. Expanding security horizons. Cybercrime is expected to cost the world $10.5 trillion annually by 2025 (compared to $3 trillion a decade ago), according to Cybersecurity Ventures.¹ How can financial institutions create an accelerated path to stronger risk management while meeting and anticipating regulatory requirements?
5. Advancing sustainable finance. The extraordinary, time-sensitive challenge to stabilize society through achieving global net-zero emissions is top of mind industry-wide. How do financial services organizations both accelerate environmental, social, and governance (ESG) progress and make sustainability good for business?
6. Exploiting data and insights. Key to advancing all of the above and laying the foundation for future success is becoming a data-driven business. How can financial institutions best tap into the power of internal and external data and build predictive and analytical capabilities that will deliver the right insights to transform all areas of their business?

Shaping the future with tech innovation

While there is no crystal ball for what the future will look like in this rapidly changing world, I am certain of the power of today’s cloud and AI technology advancements—and those on the horizon—to overcome our current challenges, stretch the boundaries of what we think is possible, and create a better future, together.

At Microsoft, our mission is to empower every person and organization on the planet to achieve more. This mission is core to everything my team and I do, and we are committed to co-innovating with our financial services customers to lay the groundwork for their future success.

Through our Microsoft Cloud technology, the industry-specific capabilities in Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services and Microsoft Cloud for Sustainability, and our global partner ecosystem, we enable institutions to bring data and information flows together with insights to enhance customer and employee experiences, optimize business processes, accelerate products to market, speed time to value, do more with less, and enable a greener financial services industry. The security, compliance, and scale of the Microsoft Cloud provides a trusted foundation for efficient operations today and sustainable growth tomorrow.

Looking ahead

We look forward to continuing to help the financial services industry navigate the present and the future and excelling in that journey.

You can find me on LinkedIn, where you can feel free to send me your thoughts and engage in a dialogue.

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¹Cybercrime To Cost The World $10.5 Trillion Annually By 2025, Cybercrime Magazine.

The post Six priorities for the financial services industry in 2023 appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.

As we continue to expand our Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services offering, we are excited to share our latest updates including new features in general availability and in preview, as well as expanded availability in select new markets. Our goal is to equip every financial organization with the digital capability required to succeed in today’s challenging economic and regulatory environments. We remain committed to helping our financial services customers improve time-to-value, reduce costs, increase agility, accelerate innovation for sustainable growth, and create deeper customer connections.

According to IDC¹, 44.6 percent of financial services respondents consider driving more revenue-generating activities the most critical technology initiative for their organizations, while 41.1 percent are focused on delivering digital services faster and accelerating the shift to the cloud. In this context, delivering technology that speeds time-to-value and improves customer outcomes is vital—and this is exactly where Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services and its latest updates can offer compelling business value.

Compliance Program for Microsoft Cloud: Supporting customers in their compliance needs

Moving to the cloud creates incredible opportunity for our customers in any industry, but for the financial services industry, meeting regulatory requirements is foundational.

At Microsoft, we understand that it is essential to meet or exceed those requirements. We have innovated in this space and are leading the technology industry with our unique compliance program that helps customers navigate the complexities of meeting regulatory requirements around the globe. We are now offering the full value of the Compliance Program for Microsoft Cloud as a part of Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services. This will provide our customers with white glove support for their risk, audit, and compliance teams. It includes four key features:

• Ask an Expert: Directly engage with Microsoft’s subject matter experts to address top-of-mind compliance concerns as well as accelerate regulatory assessment and approval cycles.
• Risk and Control Mapping: Get support from Microsoft with cloud risk assessments to help you meet your due diligence needs.
• Compliance Community: Learn about the latest regulatory compliance developments directly from Microsoft experts, industry peers, and thought leaders via ongoing virtual sessions, summits, and webcasts.
• Proactive Risk Assurance: Receive proactive communication from Microsoft’s experts on external audit results, ongoing updates of Microsoft’s cloud estate, and changing regulatory compliance requirements.

Now generally available: Intelligent appointments

Customers today expect more when it comes to convenience and simplicity in engaging with their financial institutions. The key to addressing these expectations and delivering great customer experiences is in continuous improvement of financial services offerings that better connect people, processes, and systems. In our latest release of Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services, and based on customer feedback, we have focused on continued improvements to the banking customer engagement capability to deliver differentiated customer experiences.

One key challenge for many customers is in finding the right person with the right expertise at the right time, easily and conveniently. Intelligent appointments, now generally available, is a new feature of banking customer engagement that offers customers a self-scheduling meeting experience, on the customers’ preferred channels. It easily and quickly matches customer financial product inquiries with banking experts. Customers can find contacts with the relevant skills and availability for virtual or in-person appointments.

Additionally, intelligent appointments can be used in combination with Virtual Appointments, now available in Microsoft Teams. With Virtual Appointments and intelligent appointments together, financial institutions not only get a great virtual meeting experience, but all the functionality needed to facilitate efficient and meaningful virtual or in-person meetings.  

In preview: Increased investments across verticals

For all organizations regardless of industry, the key to success in the digital era lies in the data: how to store it, secure it, combine it, and harness it. By migrating to the cloud and taking advantage of common data models, financial institutions especially are better able to put their data to work, apply intelligence, extract insights, derive new business models, and deliver better, more differentiated customer experiences through modernized applications that drive new growth.

To that end, we are pleased to highlight a set of new features we are releasing for preview (the United States and the United Kingdom only) that help our financial services customers put data to work and demonstrate our commitment to making Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services more relevant and useful to the whole industry. They include:

• Onboarding application (retail banking and other verticals): Delivers a flexible and intelligent product onboarding experience with automated document workflows enriched by AI analysis to assist the document verification process. 
• Unified client profile (wealth management): Helps deepen client relationships with meaningful advice, providing relationship managers with a good understanding of a client’s financial status, investment portfolios, financial goals, important life moments, and other personal attributes. 
• Property and casualty insurance data model (insurance):  A dedicated property and casualty insurance data model captures new attributes including policy and coverage information, claims, and insurance providers and producers.  
• Wealth management data model (wealth management): An extension to the banking data model that captures new attributes including financial goals and investment instruments specific to wealth management. 
• Small business data model extension (retail banking SMB): Extends the data model foundation of Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services to represent individuals and allows linking small businesses to individual financial holdings. 

Update on our partner ecosystem

Our partner ecosystem has been a key component to the success and scalability of Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services. Our partners are dedicated to better serving customers by helping provide more integrated solutions that reduce risk across the ecosystem, identify new opportunities for innovation, and decrease time to market.  

For this release, we are also pleased to announce new solutions and offerings from leading systems integrators (SIs) like Accenture/Avanade and PWC and independent software vendors (ISVs) like ArganoArbela, ASC, Bambu, BioCatch, Mambu, Thought Machine, and Wealth Dynamix to extend our capabilities. We’ve partnered with these organizations to publish solutions that deliver a differentiated customer experience, empower employees, and manage enterprise risk with solutions built on our offering.

New markets and languages

This month, in our continued efforts to support customers around the globe, we are expanding the international availability of Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services to include Brazil, Singapore, and the special administrative region of Hong Kong. Available languages now include Brazilian Portuguese and traditional Chinese. We plan to continue to expand our cloud presence in many more markets and languages in the months to come.   

Learn more

To learn more and stay informed, visit our Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services website.

¹IDC’s Worldwide CEO Survey, 2022: Industry Perspectives, Doc # US49613122, August 2022.

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Financial services organizations around the world have been focused on how to best accelerate their digital agendas. At the center of this modernization is the need to better serve their clients and empower employees, while at the same time reducing the costs of running their business. And they need to do this quickly.  

The key to digital transformation success is having the ability to make available internal and external data and turn it into analytical and predictive power using cloud and AI innovations.

We designed Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services with those needs in mind and have begun this journey to accelerate transformation in retail banking. Our offering is built on an industry data model to enable institutions to bring data and information flows together with rich insights to enhance customer and employee experiences, optimize business processes, accelerate products to market, and speed time to value. It also comes with a foundation of privacy, security, and regulatory compliance across Microsoft and our partner ecosystem. 

We’re continually expanding our Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services offering to help more customers take advantage of these capabilities and drive innovation for responsible growth. To that end, we are excited to share our latest milestones including our partner momentum, expanded market availability, and enhanced capabilities for creating more connected and differentiated customer experiences.

Growth of our partner ecosystem 

Our partner ecosystem has been a key component to the success and scalability of Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services. Our partners are dedicated to better serve customers by helping provide more integrated solutions that reduce risk across the ecosystem, identify new opportunities for innovation, and decrease time to market.  

Since Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services became generally available in November 2021, we’re thrilled with the interest and support from leading system integrators (SIs) and independent software vendors (ISVs) to extend its capabilities. We’ve further partnered with organizations including Accenture, ArganoArbela, ASC, Bambu, BioCatch, Mambu, PwC, Seismic, and Thought Machine to develop joint solutions that deliver a differentiated customer experience, empower employees, and manage enterprise risk with solutions built on our offering. To date, we now have more than 90 partners in our program and more than 25 solutions built on Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services that our customers can take advantage of for their unique needs.

Expanding availability

Microsoft is committed to supporting customers around the globe. Previously available in Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom, we’re expanding our offering to include another nine countries—Australia, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Switzerland.  

Further, as part of our commitment to providing a complete product experience, Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services is now available in six languages: Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, and Spanish. We have plans to continue to extend our cloud presence in many more markets and languages in the coming months. 

Enhanced customer experiences capabilities

The key to great customer engagements is to continuously improve offerings that add value to the banking experience and more seamlessly connect people, processes, and systems. In our new release, and based on customer feedback, we have focused on continued improvements to Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services’ banking customer engagement capability to deliver differentiated customer experiences.

This capability connects the banking value chain and helps agents personalize every customer interaction with financial understanding to engage with customers on their preferred channel. It intelligently manages service journeys across channels, helping reduce churn and time to resolution. A key new feature, now available in preview for the United States and the United Kingdom markets, is Intelligent Appointments.

The benefits of Intelligent Appointments

Intelligent Appointments are designed to provide customers and banking contact centers with a meeting scheduling experience, online or in-person, that easily and quickly matches the customer’s financial needs with a relevant advisor who is skilled, available, and ready to offer meaningful interactions. This feature leverages Universal Resource Scheduling and the financial services data model for results while connecting seamlessly with Microsoft Exchange and Microsoft Teams.

It’s also incredibly easy to set up a smart scheduling experience using Intelligent Appointments. As shown in this visual, process automation is key to offering flexible scheduling, providing anytime, anywhere access, and ensuring that the needs of the business and customer are met:

We are excited about how this series of updates builds on our strong foundation, and for our continued future investment in the financial services industry. 

Learn more

To learn more about how Microsoft and its partners are driving innovation in financial services with Microsoft Cloud technology, listen to Bill Borden’s recent conversation with Dan Latimore, Chief Research Officer at Celent. And to continuously stay informed about Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services, visit our website.

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In the payments and financial messaging area, SWIFT is a fundamental player, responsible for a daily average of 42 million messages. At Sibos 2019, Microsoft announced the first-ever successful public cloud-based, end-to-end payment transaction using SWIFT connectivity on Microsoft Azure, as part of our broader investment in payments.

This proof of concept by Microsoft Treasury included hosting their entire payment infrastructure on Azure—including their back-office payment infrastructure, Logic Apps connectivity solution, and SWIFT messaging infrastructure.

Since then, Microsoft has been working closely with SWIFT at a strategic level to architect its virtual connectivity solutions on Azure. With the completion of successful pilots with a range of financial institutions, the results of these investments are now coming to market.

This new solution, called Alliance Connect Virtual, will be available for customers to deploy in Azure in 2022, as a phased launch together with SWIFT. The first release is available now and the next release will follow later this year. Alliance Connect Virtual will enable financial institutions to accelerate their payments modernization strategy to reduce their on-premises footprint, rationalize the total cost of ownership, and rapidly deploy cloud-based payments architecture with the added operational, security and intelligence benefits the Microsoft Cloud offers. We have created a set of reference architectures for our customers to use as guidance in their deployments as well as Azure Policies to simplify meeting security requirements for SWIFT. Sophie Racquet, Head of Alliance Connect and Digital Connectivity Product Management at SWIFT states:

“Launching Alliance Connect Virtual marks a major milestone in supporting our customers’ journey to the cloud. Whether in the cloud or on-premises, our community will be able to experience the same level of security, reliability and availability, and attest their CSP compliance too. We’ve received overwhelming positive feedback from our pilot customers so far and I’m looking forward to our phased launch throughout 2022.”  

Bank of New York Mellon (BNY Mellon) was instrumental in the first public cloud connectivity pilot and is already using Azure-based SWIFT solutions for wire payments with Microsoft’s Treasury division. The company’s Treasury Services group, which delivers global payments, trade services, and cash management, provides payments services for Microsoft Treasury. Saket Sharma, Chief Strategy and Digital Officer for BNY Mellon Treasury Services gave his perspective on the reason for pioneering SWIFT connectivity in the cloud with Microsoft:

“As we continue to concentrate on enhancing the resiliency and capacity of our payments and broader financial market infrastructure through digitization, Microsoft Treasury and Azure have been critical collaborators with BNY Mellon in advancing this agenda. We continue to work together closely, remaining focused on providing always-on payment services and accelerating delivery of new capabilities to clients around the world.” 

Anita Mehra, Corporate Vice President of Global Treasury and Financial Services at Microsoft also shared her view on the collaboration:

“We are thrilled to partner with SWIFT in bringing their Alliance Connect Virtual offering to the Azure public cloud. This allows Microsoft Treasury, an early adopter of SWIFT, to continue our focus on security, compliance & resiliency of customer data.”

SWIFT connectivity on Azure goes further than simply translating an on-premises service to one that runs in the cloud. Microsoft will be offering additional value-add services to support our customers which will include unique seamless integration capabilities with back-end systems and support to the ISO20022 migration initiative (using Azure Logic Apps), and an automated and seamless approach to ensure compliance with SWIFT’s Customer Security Programme “CSP” (using Azure Policy solution for SWIFT CSCFv2022).

Microsoft partners with a range of leading global systems integrators in the financial services industry. To help customers take advantage of the new SWIFT connectivity solution on Azure, we’ve worked with Capgemini, Microsoft’s 2021 Partner of the Year for Financial Services, to build services to help financial institutions with the migration of their current SWIFT infrastructure, including Alliance Access, Alliance Messaging Hub (AMH) or AutoClient, to enable rapid deployment of the SWIFT connectivity solutions on Azure. Jeroen Holscher, Head of Global Payments at Capgemini Financial Services shares his perspective:

‘’Our long-standing strategic partnership with Microsoft and SWIFT’s payments technology is the perfect union to help our customers rapidly transition from on-premise to cloud. Together, we have built a strong framework for enterprises to mitigate risk, reduce TCO, drive innovation at scale, and achieve operational efficiencies. We are very excited to collaborate with Microsoft and support our client portfolio across the banking, financial and other industries to help them build a future-ready business for tomorrow.’’ 

At Microsoft, we want to ensure that every organization has the digital capability required to succeed going forward and are committed to helping our financial services customers improve time to value, reduce costs, increase agility, and accelerate innovation for sustainable growth. This latest initiative with SWIFT highlights that commitment, and we look forward to the value it will bring to drive innovation for our mutual customers and the financial services industry.

Additional Microsoft resources

Learn more information about architectural guidance for the deployment of Alliance Connect Virtual on Azure today. And to access additional resources and learn how financial services organizations are transforming digitally using technologies and solutions from Microsoft and our partners, visit our banking, capital markets, insurance, and Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services home pages.

The post Accelerating payments modernization in the cloud with SWIFT appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.

2021 has been an incredible year of change for the financial services industry. We saw organizations across financial services accelerate digital innovation at a record pace. This has also been an important year for us here at Microsoft. We launched Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services and made significant advancements with the industry’s leading SIs and ISVs, as we doubled down on our long-standing commitment to provide a depth and breadth of specialized support for the financial services industry and help our customers succeed in today’s rapidly evolving landscape.

As we close 2021, I wanted to share some of the breakthrough momentum in key areas of transformation this past year and look at what’s ahead in 2022. 

Modernizing core platforms 

The pandemic has prompted financial services organizations to re-evaluate legacy systems to save on costs while gaining all the advantages of a modern system. Microsoft is focused on working with financial services institutions across banking, capital markets, and insurance to modernize core systems and move to the cloud to reduce costs, improve operational efficiencies, and create a platform for agile business.  

This year, a number of leading institutions embraced our cloud platform to unlock new value creation. Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, for example, is using Microsoft Azure as its primary cloud platform, enabling it to scale and modernize its banking platform, while building in additional resiliency, efficiency, and agility. We also further partnered with Africa’s largest financial institution Standard Bank whose growing investment in the Microsoft Cloud will enable the innovation, efficiencies, and resilience required to respond to market dynamics and customer needs.  

As part of a strategic cloud partnership, Morgan Stanley is currently using Microsoft Azure to accelerate the modernization of its IT environment to enhance client, employee, and developer experiences. And in a significant development for the global payments industry, BNY Mellon successfully migrated Microsoft Treasury’s wire payments into the cloud, using Azure, marking an exciting milestone in the modernization of payments. 

Delivering differentiated customer experiences 

As the pandemic transformed customer behaviors and expectations, much of the industry’s need to modernize is centered on taking their client engagement to new levels. To that end, Swiss Re Corporate Solutions decided to transform its traditional customer relationship management (CRM) solution into a data-driven customer engagement management platform by leveraging Azure, Azure Databricks, and Azure Machine Learning. New Zealand’s largest bank Westpac also shares how they are using Microsoft Dynamics 365 to drive customer-focused change across its organization to better serve its customers.

We also worked with Progressive to use the latest capabilities in Azure AI to level up its chatbot journey and strengthen customer relationships through customized, rewarding interactions. And we advanced our strategic alliance with MSCI with new Azure-based innovations for the global investment industry, enhancing MSCI’s client experience among the world’s most sophisticated investors, including asset managers, asset owners, hedge funds, and banks. 

Empowering employees through teamwork 

We are all experiencing a once-in-a-generation shift in how, when, and where we work. Accelerating workplace modernization is another important investment area for us, helping enable financial services institutions to improve productivity and empower flexibility for remote work through secure collaboration, communications, and business process innovation technologies and access to key information from any location. 

Zurich Insurance is doing some exciting work to get future-ready with Microsoft 365 tools that is modernizing customer service, empowering colleagues to get the best user experience, and increasing employee satisfaction. Rabobank also chose Microsoft 365 as the platform for its One Digital Workplace vision to help employees work better together by sharing knowledge and experience to deliver a superior customer experience. The bank improved mobility and collaboration without compromising security.  

Dutch bank ABN AMRO is currently building a culture of transformation with Microsoft cloud technology and is now ready to transform employee user adoption and increase both employee and customer satisfaction—all while reducing time-to-market with new capabilities. Nationwide also shares how it is embracing change by finding new ways to bring their people-focused mission to a hybrid work scenario with Microsoft 365.

Managing risk and cybersecurity 

The pandemic showed us that despite major change, security and compliance remain at the core. As a company, Microsoft has a deep and long history and commitment to security and compliance, and we are focused on helping our financial services customers deepen risk insights and facilitate compliance while protecting their organizations and employees. 

This year, Wells Fargo marked the next step in its digital transformation journey with a new multi-cloud strategy, relying on Microsoft Azure to provide a trusted and secure foundation across all the institution’s functions and better manage risk. We also worked with Japan’s Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group in its move to the cloud, choosing Azure as the common system infrastructure for its risk management, security, and cost-savings benefits.  

UBS is also using Microsoft Azure for global scale and security and shares where they are today as a result. And TD Securities recently built on its Microsoft 365 Communication Compliance infrastructure with a highly secure, compliant global Microsoft Teams deployment.  

Enabling a green financial services industry 

The financial services industry is currently prioritizing sustainability and taking responsibility for its role in climate action. Microsoft is focused on empowering our financial services clients to create ESG (environmental, social, and governance) solutions and deliver on their organizational sustainability priorities. 

For example, earlier this year, we joined forces with UK bank NatWest Group to help UK businesses better understand their carbon footprints and create tailored actions to reduce their carbon emissions leveraging our Microsoft cloud, data, and AI platform. 

We also teamed up with Munich Re to help deploy secure climate change risk assessments that can predict possible financial impacts years into the future using Azure. And in a recent article, Netherland’s Rabobank and Italian fintech startup Flowe shared how our technology is helping them nurture a more sustainable planet. You can also learn more about ESG as a board-room priority. 

A launchpad for innovation and growth 

When it comes to digital tools and the cloud, our customers have been clear that they need cloud services tailored to their specific needs and challenges. For the financial services industry, we are answering this need through our Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services, which we launched in November.

This industry-specific cloud introduces new capabilities that add to our existing public cloud offerings and in combination truly unlock the power and value of the Microsoft Cloud to help innovate for responsible and sustainable growth. Our partners are also instrumental to the success and scalability of Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services, and we’re thrilled to have a growing ecosystem of services and ISV partners already working to extend its capabilities. Learn more about Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services.

Looking to the future 

As we approach 2022, I see no signs of the industry slowing down. Major shifts in consumer and SME trends will ratchet up industry competition as customer experience becomes the next competitive battleground. Financial services companies will need to take a hard look at their business models to identify new opportunities to help their customers, partner across the industry to leverage competitive strengths, and embed financial services throughout commerce experiences.

Another big trend we’ll see is in workforce transformation. Flexible work is here to stay, and the talent landscape has fundamentally shifted. A thoughtful approach to hybrid work will be critical for attracting and retaining diverse talent. Here I share more trends on where the financial services industry is today and where it’s headed.

And while there is no simple roadmap for what’s ahead, digital acceleration is creating tremendous opportunities to stretch the boundaries of what’s possible, in ways we are just starting to imagine. That’s why we want to ensure that every organization has the digital capability needed to succeed going forward and are committed to helping our financial services customers improve time to value, reduce costs, increase agility, and accelerate innovation for sustainable growth. 

We plan to share more of these examples, success stories, and trends in the coming year. Happy New Year everyone.

The post Microsoft and the financial services industry: A year in review and 2022 trends ahead appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.

The theme of last week’s Sibos 2021 financial services event was “Recharging Global Finance — the digital journey evolves” — with the opportunity to debate how to recharge global finance and accelerate change for the better.

It was a very fitting and thoughtful discussion, given the seismic shifts within the financial services industry. As we all know, the pandemic caused major disruption. It accelerated transformation at a record pace. It heightened awareness around both environmental and social justice issues. And it cemented the value of digitization and digital channels, with no signs of slowing down.

With 19,000 attendees from nearly every country in the world, Sibos 2021 offered a pulse on where the industry is today, and where it’s headed. Here are my observations and thoughts:

1. Customer engagement is the next competitive battleground.

While customer experience isn’t a new topic, at this year’s Sibos there was a renewed focus and sense of urgency. As the pandemic changed customer behaviors and expectations, financial institutions need to take their client engagement to new levels. To successfully compete means investing in new business models, products, and capabilities that are built around customer needs and create long-term loyalty.

2. The next great disruption is hybrid work.

We are all experiencing a once-in-a-generation shift in how, when, and where we work. And while we’re all learning as we go, there are a few things we can be certain of. Today’s collaboration tools empowered financial services employees to perform incredibly well in a remote environment. Flexible work is here to stay, and the talent landscape has fundamentally shifted. A thoughtful approach to hybrid work will be critical for attracting and retaining diverse talent.

 3. The industry is opening up to open platforms.

As part of the need for differentiating new experiences, risk management, and compliance, we’re also seeing the shift towards open and interconnected ecosystems through modernization of core platforms including payments and core banking systems. At Sibos, I heard several exciting, real-world examples of open APIs enabling new partnerships that drove faster value, innovation, and enhanced customer service.

4. Security and compliance remain at the core.

Financial institutions that can best manage their regulatory and compliance data will be on an accelerated path to stronger risk management and improved operational efficiency. And while financial institutions want new innovations to deliver better value to customers, they will not make the cut unless they are operating within appropriate compliance constructs.

5. Committing to sustainability.

It was clear from this year’s event that the financial industry is prioritizing sustainability and taking responsibility for its role in climate action. Discussions spanned from what sustainable finance is, to its risks and opportunities, to key steps financial institutions can take to create meaningful action on climate change. A lot of great food for thought!

6. Building a more equitable future for all.

I was incredibly pleased to see so much discussion around diversity, equity, and inclusion. It’s important we continue to make a focused effort to build diversity both across the financial services industry as a whole and at an organizational level. And we are just scratching the surface of technology’s potential to help the industry make a bigger impact and create more inclusive, accessible, and responsible banking experiences that will enrich the lives of people around the world.

7. Banking on data.

Data has been talked a lot about in the industry, but now there’s a huge focus in all business areas across the financial institution, certainly in the payments space. Those that had digital and artificial intelligence (AI) in place had a much easier time responding to the pandemic and have a jump start on continued agility, innovation, and transformation. It’s about having the ability to take available internal and external data and turn it into analytical and predictive power using cloud and AI innovations. We believe the leading indicator of digital transformation success can be measured by an organization’s ability to build these predictive and analytical capabilities.

Accelerating innovation for responsible and sustainable growth

At Microsoft, understanding the financial services industry’s needs and objectives is very important to us. We want to ensure that every organization has the digital capability required to succeed going forward and are committed to helping our financial services customers improve time to value, reduce costs, increase agility, and accelerate innovation for sustainable growth.

At Sibos, we shared how the Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services provides capabilities to manage data to deliver differentiated experiences, empower employees, combat financial crime, modernize payments and core banking, and enable green initiatives while facilitating security, compliance, and interoperability.

Our subject matter experts also participated in thought-provoking sessions on a variety of topics—from the latest in cybersecurity, to payment hubs, to the future of ecosystems, and real-time Treasury capabilities.

And in a significant development for the global payments industry, BNY Mellon announced the successful migration of Microsoft Treasury’s wire payments into the cloud, using Microsoft Azure, marking an exciting milestone in the modernization of payments.

The opportunities ahead

I’m excited about the industry’s future. With today’s digital acceleration, financial services organizations have tremendous opportunities to stretch the boundaries of what’s possible in ways we wouldn’t have believed just a year ago while generating value not only for their customers but also for the global communities in which we all exist.

To learn more about Microsoft’s activities at Sibos and our ongoing work in the financial services industry, visit our virtual exhibition booth and Financial Services page.

I’d also like to invite you to join me at the Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services Industry Digital Forum, October 26, 2021, where we’ll introduce our attendees to Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services and show you its new capabilities in action.

The post Top 7 takeaways from Sibos 2021 appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.

The pandemic cemented the value of digitization and digital channels in the financial services industry—and created new expectations with customers and employees. In talking with our customers every day, financial services organizations have increased focus on how to accelerate their digital agendas to better serve their clients and empower employees, while at the same time continuing to reduce the costs of running their businesses.

This has put a strong emphasis on the use of cloud technologies and services, time to value, and cost reduction all in parallel. And when it comes to digital tools and the cloud, our customers have been clear that they need cloud services tailored to their specific needs and challenges.

That’s why I’m thrilled to share that Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services will be generally available beginning November 1, 2021. This industry-specific cloud introduces new capabilities that add to our existing public cloud offerings and in combination truly unlock the power and value of the Microsoft Cloud to help innovate for responsible and sustainable growth Our industry cloud has a foundation of privacy, security, and regulatory compliance across Microsoft and our partner ecosystem, and it is built on an industry data model that enables interoperability and innovation. In addition, we are releasing new capabilities to help enable retail banks to enhance customer and employee experiences as well as drive loyalty and customer growth.

We are proud to share that Navy Federal Credit Union and Virgin Money UK are among the first to explore the new capabilities to help their customers and employees achieve what is important to them. Navy Federal Credit Union and Virgin Money UK are part of a group of institutions partnering with us in preview to help shape future capabilities to come.

“At Virgin Money UK we are always looking at ways to innovate and deliver a world class, digital customer experience. We see Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services accelerating that journey of digitizing our customer experience, while enabling us to scale and grow. Microsoft’s technologies have a broad range of applications and meaningful insights; whether it is to help advise customers on their financial plans or servicing their needs under their existing portfolio of products. This transformation will also support our efforts to enhance our employee experience, empowering our frontline colleagues to deliver the best heartfelt service for our customers, working together to make money simpler and easier. ” — Fraser Ingram, Chief Digital and Innovation Officer at Virgin Money UK.

A launchpad for innovation and growth

We want to ensure that every organization has the digital capability required to succeed going forward and are committed to helping our financial services customers improve time to value, reduce costs, increase agility, and accelerate innovation for sustainable growth.

Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services integrates cloud services across the depth of our offerings—Microsoft Azure, Microsoft 365, Microsoft Dynamics 365, and Microsoft Power Platform—underpinned by an industry data model, with new capabilities and customization unique to the financial services industry. It was also designed for even the most complex control frameworks and regulatory requirements facing the industry, with our multi-layered security, comprehensive compliance, and trust commitments built-in.

All this helps enable financial institutions and our industry partners to unlock unprecedented value. Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services helps optimize business processes through integrated collaboration and omnichannel communications capabilities and enhances the customer experience through comprehensive customer insights and personalized customer interactions. Additionally, Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services helps accelerate products to market, removes data silos to turn insights into action, and defends against fraud. It offers the flexibility to adopt the capabilities in a modularized fashion.

Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services’ industry data model also enables Microsoft’s partners and customers to extend the value of the platform with additional solutions. These capabilities help organizations align to business and operational needs and deploy quickly to accelerate time to value.

Now, let me share a closer look at the capabilities for retail banking that will be available on November 1, 2021, and more on how our ecosystem of partners is key to our Cloud’s value equation.

Enhancing customer and employee experiences

Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services is designed to address critical needs of retail banking by creating differentiated customer experiences consumers now expect and empowering employees through teamwork.

Eighty-one percent of consumers said easy access and flexible banking will motivate them to switch to a new-age financial provider, according to Capgemini’s World Retail Banking Report 2021. As customers continue to engage digitally, continued focus to ensure data connectivity, interoperability of ecosystems, and actionable insights are key to retaining customers and winning over new ones.

Additionally, employees need to have the right tools as well as change management in processes to adapt to the current environment to service customers and support each other and their respected departments. Armed with customer insights and processes that offer automation, collaboration, and communications, employees can excel in their roles and are given a better opportunity to accomplish their goals. Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services’ capabilities in this area include:

• Unified customer profile: Helps financial services organizations tailor customer experiences through a 360-degree view of the customer by bringing together financial, behavioral, and demographic data.
• Customer onboarding: Provides customers with easy access loan apps and self-service tools, helping streamline the loan process to enhance customer experience and loyalty while increasing organizational and employee productivity.
• Banking customer engagement: Helps personalize customer interaction with financial understanding to engage with customers on their preferred channel in a meaningful way, while intelligently managing their journeys across channels, to reduce churn and time to resolution.
• Collaboration manager: Enables automation and collaboration across front and back office. Helps improve business-to-consumer communications to accelerate lending processes, minimize errors, and enhance customer experience.

Combatting financial crime

While total combined fraud losses climbed to $56 billion in 2020, identity fraud scams accounted for $43 billion of that cost, per Javelin Strategy & Research. With a vast number of transactions and more customers online than ever, there is a need to analyze data and implement the unique nature of an organization’s business. Addressing fraud not only protects customers but also safeguards an organization’s reputation and protects from regulatory risk. Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services’ capabilities in this area include:

• Account protection: Helps financial institutions protect their reputation at the digital identity account layer by helping to identify and prevent fraud at account creation and login. This helps protect against bot attacks, fake account creation, account takeover, and fraudulent account access.
• Purchase protection: Helps protect the merchant services arms of financial institutions and merchants from online purchase fraud using advanced adaptive AI, reducing false positives and optimizing acceptance rates.

Managing security and compliance

Global and regional regulatory compliance requirements continue to expand, and most organizations are facing difficulties to keep up with increasing requirements and higher levels of scrutiny being applied by financial services regulators. Cybercrime has also increased dramatically during the pandemic—in the United States, for example, the FBI’s Internet Crime Complaint Center found cybercrime complaints hiked by 100 percent over a 14-month period—with attacks becoming more sophisticated. Financial services organizations that use the latest technologies to manage their overall security and compliance posture will find themselves in a stronger position to address these risk management and compliance challenges in a rapidly changing world. Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services’ capabilities in this area include:

• Risk assurance and support: A premium white-glove service provided by a dedicated team of engineering subject matter experts that support internal and external risk, audit, and compliance teams in addressing financial services regulatory compliance, cybersecurity, and privacy.
• Regulatory compliance assessments: Helps organizations manage compliance requirements with greater ease and convenience from taking inventory of data protection risks to managing the complexities of implementing controls, staying current with regulations and certifications, and reporting to auditors.

These new capabilities coupled with our existing foundational capabilities—such as our zero-standing access, our global data center footprint with over 60 announced regions, and our commitment to SSAE SOC 2 certifications—will help organizations address security and compliance challenges more effectively.

Integrating the power of partnership

The power of Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services doesn’t stop with our first-party technologies and solutions. Our partners are instrumental to its success and scalability. We’re very pleased to welcome services partners Accenture, Avanade, Avtex, Capgemini, EY, Publicis Sapient, KPMG, PwC, and ISV partners Backbase, BaseCap, Finastra, Mortgage365, VeriPark, and Zafin, who are joining us for Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services’ November 1, 2021, launch.

Microsoft’s growing ecosystem of partners extends the robust capabilities of Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services. Our partners are dedicated to better serving customers by helping provide more integrated solutions that reduce risk across the ecosystem, identify new opportunities for innovation, and decrease time to market.

Microsoft’s industry data model further allows partners to extend and connect to our solutions by amplifying cloud capabilities and enabling a frictionless ecosystem for shared customers. Zafin is one of our first partners to join us on this journey to build an industry data model to accelerate innovation. Zafin CEO Al Karim Somji shares his perspective:

“To remain competitive in a rapidly evolving banking landscape, financial institutions are focused on core modernization and digital transformation. Our award-winning SaaS product and pricing platform, together with Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services, simplifies the core by externalizing product and pricing, enabling the delivery of more personalized banking experiences for customers. Together, Zafin and Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services are empowering bank employees with actionable insights by enabling the unified customer profile to deliver product and package recommendations driven by the industry data model, helping ensure compliance with regulatory requirements, and accelerating their digital transformation strategies.”

I would like to thank the financial services organizations, Microsoft partners, and other industry leaders who helped provide impactful guidance on how we can best help the industry in its digital path forward. We believe Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services has the foundation needed to help financial institutions accelerate innovation for responsible growth, and it offers the right set of capabilities for retail banking to meet their most pressing needs for enhancing customer and employee experiences, combatting financial crime, and managing security and compliance.

We would love to learn more from you about where we can partner to continue to navigate the present and future. Please join us at the Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services Digital Forum, October 26, 2021, where we will share additional details and show you the capabilities in action.

To learn more about Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services, visit our website.

The post Microsoft Cloud for Financial Services: Accelerating innovation for sustainable growth appeared first on Microsoft Industry Blogs.