The company has also registered staggering growth revenue of over 50% in 2017 and a positive EBITDA. Since its launch in November 2014, Virgin Mobile has provided value-added offerings, innovative marketing and communication plans, and growth and expansion strategy. This has made the company one of the fastest growing telecom providers in Saudi Arabia, stated reports.

CEO Fouad Halawi said, “I am extremely delighted with our continued success and equally proud of every individual effort. I am confident that Virgin Mobile KSA will continue to lead the change in the region and eventually set the stage for our future digital aspirations.

We are fully prepared for what the future may bring, as we have great plans for 2018. Our mission remains to take Virgin Mobile KSA to a whole new level, irrespective of the constantly changing market dynamics.”

The post Virgin Mobile KSA aims to cross 3.5 million subscribers by year-end appeared first on International Finance.

Here’s an exclusive interview with Rosie Kmeid, Vice President – Global Corporate Communications & Marketing at Path Solutions, the leader in Islamic core banking platforms mainly in Africa, a region which is becoming the world’s hottest hub for this new banking model.

Let us start from the basics. What does “Islamic core banking system” mean?
As you know, a core banking system is the software stack which is used to support a bank’s most common transactions like opening accounts, debit card withdrawals or payment processing. An Islamic one is similar to the conventional system, but it is compliant with the Sharia, and covers the following:

• The sources of funds, such as URIAs, Wadiah savings, Wadiah current accounts.
• The uses of funds, such as Murabaha, Musharaka, Ijara, etc.
• RIAs account management, Islamic treasury, Islamic trade finance, CRM, CIF, and the related delivery channels like phone banking, Internet banking and ATMs.  
• Supports proper recording, tracking and management of URIAs, the pools of funds.
• Produces the related accounting entries and confirmations according to industry standards and the Sharia rules and regulations.
• Supports Sharia audit procedures (transaction processing log and maintenance of legal documentation).
• Incorporates the Hijri calendar and Zakat calculator.

Thus, a state-of-the-art Islamic banking suite is imperative to manage those services. Very often, functions which sit outside these core transactions, are managed by separate systems or dedicated standalone systems. Our system however, unifies all of these disparate systems on a common core and code base, where the services are then plugged-in in a modular fashion that allows for fast and easy configuration of the required Islamic banking products.

The system has been designed with efficiency as a priority. Most processes can be automated, supporting straight-through-processing (STP), reducing the number of errors and the need for manual intervention, and driving down operating costs.

You have a pretty bold slogan in your advertising campaign: “We guide your ambitions”. How would you materialize this concept?
At Path Solutions, we focus on providing Sharia-compliant core banking platforms to Islamic banks and Islamic microfinance companies looking to scale up their offerings using digital technology. The strapline of “We guide your ambitions” communicates what we do best so that these institutions benefit from increased efficiency and profitability in the digital era. We help them learn global best practices of digital transition.

In this context, we simply build the technology required by end users to perform banking transactions from remote and unbanked areas using portable devices in a Sharia-compliant and transparent manner.

We go above and beyond to ensure our clients’ complete satisfaction.

How do you differentiate yourself from the likes of Temenos, Oracle FS and Tosan?
There are possibly as many as 15 core banking system vendors worldwide who claim offering an Islamic banking suite, most of these have been around for over a decade but have not implemented a single project at an Islamic bank. The IT vendors you mentioned do provide the Islamic functionality but they are generally referred to as legacy providers. It is true that their systems are well proven and reliable, however their systems are not certified by a standard-setting body as concordant with the Sharia, and they also tend to be inflexible and are incredibly expensive to deploy and maintain, making them inaccessible to small and medium-sized Islamic banks.

Path Solutions is a proven industry leader, a key technology enabler and a business partner for over 130 prestigious Islamic banks worldwide. With over 25 years of solid experience in Islamic core banking platforms, Path Solutions is a major contributor to the development and growth of modern Islamic banking, by researching industry new trends and developing innovative solutions to meet the needs of a fast-growing community.

Our Sharia-compliant banking suite covers the full spectrum of functional requirements in accordance with the Islamic law. It features complete management of products and mechanisms to serve operations according to the Sharia rules and regulations. It offers full compliance while providing flexibility and efficiency of operations, reducing costs, maximising productivity and delivering high-quality client service experience.

Besides, our suite is built based on modern architectural principles, i.e. cloud-ready, built on a service-oriented open architecture and highly componentized. The SOA architecture means our Islamic core banking system is highly flexible, can be easily integrated with other systems and incorporates an adaptive platform for innovative banking.

Does Path Solutions fall under the label “banking-as-a-platform”? In what sense do you have a platform business model?
Our banking platform fulfills all clients’ needs with regard to technologically supporting their business requirements, ranging from a fully managed BaaP service all the way down to just providing the software and letting the client integrate and run. In parallel to the BaaP, our platform is engineered to provide a complete open ecosystem where we supply our powerful processing engine, while opening up the platform and access to our clients’ delivery channels if needed.

The post Leading the way in revolutionizing Islamic banking in the digital era appeared first on International Finance.

Tell us a bit of history about yourself and the rest of the Evareium team
Since 1995, I’ve been working in Europe and the GCC region, based out of Dubai, almost exclusively on real estate, hospitality, and related projects in an advisory and investment management capacity. Previously, I held the role of vice-president at leading private equity firm The Abraaj Group, and prior to that I was instrumental in the formation of what is now Jones Lang LaSalle MENA in 2004. I have a passion for creating value for stakeholders in the real estate space and delivering meaningful models to pioneer new initiatives that help transition current investment and project paradigms into new ones that fit with changing investment and consumer needs.

We have hand-picked the Evareium team to comprise strong professionals from similar backgrounds with particular expertise garnered from working with leading groups in the region.

What’s more, we have been very fortunate to be partnering with world-class blockchain and fundraising advisory firms regionally and internationally which gives us great scope for launching the Evareium project, including Block Gemini Technologies and Blockvisory in Dubai, Rouge Ventures in Hong Kong, as well as asset enhancement and cost-saving specialists Tellus Environmental Specialists from the UK.

What is your new project – Evareium?
Evareium is a digitalized real estate investment initiative founded on blockchain technology. The vision is to create a Limited Partner/General Partner fund in the Cayman Islands which will raise and deploy capital initially into the real estate sector in the GCC region, with a particular focus on Dubai and the wider UAE.

With Dubai being a forerunner in the full government integration of blockchain, Evareium is a new way for people to invest digitally in real estate whilst avoiding certain key disadvantages of being a single, direct, physical owner of property.

What was the genesis of such a project?
Having lived in Dubai since 2001 and seen the exponential growth of the real estate sector in the region, I’ve noticed a heavy concentration of project capital generated from retail investors/owners, and especially the pre-selling of properties, but far less institutional capital. What’s surprising is that almost every developed city globally has a far larger proportion of institutional capital underpinning its real estate economy. Evareium sets out to bridge that gap by migrating the pool of capital investment it raises and deploys into permanent institutional format, which will help to create a pillar of stability in the market and drive value for investors wanting a more passive but valuable exposure to what is by far the most favoured asset class in the region.

What do you mean by the digitalization of real estate investment?
Real estate attracts huge volumes of investment and investors globally every day. But inherently, being a physical asset, owning real estate as a single unit owner can have some major drawbacks – mainly that you must find a tenant, collect rent, maintain the property and of course, sell it at some point. This can drain an investor’s time and resources and have very imperfect results.

Evareium removes all these issues by exchanging a token with investors, carrying the benefits of profits, dividends and gains from Evareium’s investment into real estate projects. By listing the token on exchanges, investors have much needed opportunity for liquidity and exit from their investment as they desire.

Why is that important?
By introducing a tokenized layer representing ownership of assets, it enables instantaneous transfer of interests by leveraging blockchain technology, therefore the physical processes of handling asset exchange, which can be cumbersome, time-consuming and costly, are effectively eradicated.

This is particularly evident in real estate investment, because it is inherently a very illiquid asset class; transacting property assets in a rapid manner is challenging and time-consuming.

Evareium is therefore able to offer the benefits of traditional real estate investment models whilst creating a tokenized exchange layer which eradicates inherent illiquidity. We strongly believe this will fundamentally change the way we will comprehend asset ownership and consume real estate investment over the coming decades.

Will the digitalization phenomenon affect our daily lives?
Digitalization is already affecting our lives and at a rapid pace. Almost every part of our daily lives and consuming habits are being positively affected by digitalization – from buying movies and music to using transportation, ordering groceries to controlling our homes – digitalization is creating a more convenient, instantaneous and time-efficient means to transfer interests and value in products and services.

Now with the advent of blockchain we can exchange value in a trusted and immutable manner without the identities of investors being known necessarily to one another. This maintains the key characteristic of a private equity fund model but introduces the opportunity of instant liquidity.

What are the key features of Evareium?
Evareium follows a classic limited partnership model used by private funds globally, but with the added feature of one of the limited partners being a block of EVM token holders. Blockchain exchange allows the confidentiality of investors’ interests to be maintained in exactly the same way as a private equity fund, but with the added feature of liquidity to be built into the platform. And who doesn’t want the option of liquidity over a 10 year or more investment life of a fund?

How is the project structured?
Evarei is an advisor to Evareium, which is the investment model initiative. Although the investment strategy is Middle East-focused, the Evareium initiative is domiciled in the Cayman Islands since it’s a favoured location globally for such pooled investment initiatives.

We plan to launch an Initial Token Offering (ITO) in the near future and partner with a leading, locally regulated advisor to bring additional features to the model.

How much of Evareium is a technological achievement versus a new real estate investment model?
About half and half really. The marriage of technology into real estate investment is just beginning. Huge transformation is happening in terms of growth industries like IoT (the Internet of Things), smart digital contracts based on blockchain and our ability to harness these technological phenomena to create a vastly different approach to real estate investment procurement and management in a more rapid, transparent and valuable manner.

Why is this model the future?
The overriding benefits centre around ultra-convenience and choice. The ability to tokenize an investor’s entry point and interest in a fund provides for rapid onboarding and instant exchange in essentially a direct, peer-to-peer manner. It also means the issuer does not have to deal with the costs, settlement timeframes and complexities of a public exchange listing, nor the burdens and limitations faced by limited partners in a traditional private equity fund of selling their participation by finding and agreeing to terms with another institutional investor, not to mention getting the General Partner’s approval. All while still applying requisite levels of integrity and governance.

Beyond these features, an entire new paradigm towards transparent capitalism within real estate is achievable through smart contracts and a blockchain-founded architecture; and we have been working on developing a complete symbiotic ecosystem approach to fully realise and unlock this value.

 www.evareium.io

The post The future of real estate unlocked by Evareium project appeared first on International Finance.

The Universal Postal Union (UPU) has recently established a Financial Inclusion Technical Assistance Facility (FITAF), which will receive significant support from Visa. As Stephen Kehoe, Head of Global Financial Inclusion at Visa Inc., explains, “Visa’s partnership with the UPU will make a significant contribution to financial inclusion. This systematic effort to leverage Posts’ services, size and reach will help build the comprehensive digital network needed to benefit whole societies, and especially help reach two priority groups of unbanked people: rural poor and women.” FITAF was created by the UPU to advance financial inclusion, by accelerating the digitization of postal financial services and increasing their uptake, to reach last-mile customers and businesses.

In order to increase the number of postal accounts by 250 million by 2020 and support the launch of digital financial service projects for financial inclusion from 20 Posts, FITAF will champion postal action on inclusive digital financial services, conduct research to identify key actions and provide qualifying Posts with technical assistance to improve and expand their capabilities. “This partnership is a key milestone in our efforts to position the postal network as a critical tool for delivering economic and social development to all,” emphasizes Bishar A. Hussein, UPU Director General. “Thanks to its universal coverage, to its long history as a financial actor and to the trust it holds amongst the citizens of the world, the postal sector is in a unique position to provide access to financial services to all and especially the underserved. We need to leverage that unique position.”

The situation

Over 2 billion adults worldwide were unbanked in 2014. Of those that are banked, 19% have an account at a Post, making the postal sector the second largest contributor to financial inclusion after banks. Postal networks are well positioned to meet the financial needs of some of the world’s hardest-to-reach populations. “Governments and international development stakeholders increasingly see the postal network, with its ability to deliver to everyone, everywhere and at all times, as critical infrastructure to achieving a whole range of public services and policies, including their financial inclusion objectives,” explains Siva Somasundram, UPU Director of Markets Development and Regulation.

Indeed Posts have extensive, government-backed networks that reach across countries into both urban and remote rural areas. They provide numerous services – including financial services – to customers of all income levels; they often distribute government payments, such as pensions or social support; and their public, egalitarian mission makes their services affordable and accessible to all segments of society. However, significant investment and transformation is required to improve postal capacities and services, so as to be able to deliver digital financial services and reap their many benefits.

The FITAF approach

FITAF will provide technical assistance to help Posts launch new digital financial services at a national level. Assistance will be offered according to need, based on requests from post offices, local levels of digital delivery, and the type of issue – such as product, network (e.g. back office) and systems (e.g. postal network, IT infrastructure). The criteria for selection include: commitment from the Post’s management and from government leaders; the existence of a legal and regulatory framework to enable the Post to deliver financial services; evidence of innovation; and willingness to co-fund 20% of costs. Support will also include designing mobile-based strategies for the Post, expanding Post-owned services, and capacity building.

The Facility carries out research to inform and advance Post-based financial inclusion. This includes developing case studies and best practices, identifying service and quality gaps, and creating a readiness guide to help Posts prepare to offer digital financial service. The Facility will also examine the role of Posts in supporting the financial inclusion of micro and small merchants near their branches. A crucial aspect of this work is sharing new insights and resources with UPU members and other stakeholders through regional and leadership meetings, as well as at partner events. For example, UPU organized four regional workshops for members in 2017 to explain the importance of digitization and to present effective business models and services.

Partner coordination

Visa joins the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and the UPU in funding the Financial Inclusion Technical Assistance Facility. Visa will provide financial support for three years through a charitable grant. The UPU has collaborated with a number of Visa’s global financial inclusion partners, including the Alliance for Financial Inclusion and Better than Cash Alliance, which the UPU joined in 2015. It has also issued joint research publications on financial inclusion with the World Bank, UN Women and the International Labor Organization, and collaborated with diverse service providers at the country level – policy makers, academics and social-welfare organizations. This inter-connectedness exemplifies the type of collaborative, coordinated approaches needed to achieve financial inclusion.

The post Visa to support financial inclusion programme appeared first on International Finance.

Various new payment methods are coming up, but there is no clarity on whether we will pay with our mobile phone, our smartwatch, our fingerprint or with a wink in the future.

In Europe, mobile payments are a work in progress. As in any building process, some ideas are successful while a few are discarded. Yapital or mpass have fallen, but new ideas are emerging almost every day.

The setbacks have not taken any of the steam out of the digitisation train. New technologies are emerging every day.

In Switzerland, being a country known for banking and secrecy, PSD2 is a much-discussed topic. In EU countries, banks are working towards implementation of the regulations of PSD2.

But, one way or the other, the financial sector faces a lot of challenges. These developments and challenges will be discussed at the 6th Swiss Payment Forum to be held in Zurich on November 6-7.

Speakers and participants at the annual conference will discuss the most important payment trends in Switzerland, the effects of biometry on digital payments, the implication of PSD2 for merchants and banks, Value Added Services as a mean to escape the price spiral and the potential of blockchain as a game changer not only in the financial sector.

The post PSD2, digitisation to dominate Swiss Payment Forum appeared first on International Finance.

The adoption of Bolero solutions by SABB puts the bank at the forefront of innovation and makes it the first bank in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to enable clients to initiate transactions electronically. The partnership will enable SABB to eradicate time-consuming inefficiencies associated with paper documents.

In accordance with the requirements of SABB’s corporate clients, the partnership will initially provide Bolero’s electronic guarantees solution, as a first step towards the provision of a wider range of digitised trade documentation solutions via the Bolero platform.

“We are extremely pleased to enter this partnership with Bolero which puts SABB at the cutting edge of trade innovation, giving our clients all the far-reaching advantages of transaction-speed and security that flow from the Bolero digital trade solutions,” said David Dew, Managing Director, SABB.

“As the pre-eminent trade bank in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia we see this partnership with Bolero as an essential part of our commitment to excellence and innovation in the service of our highly-valued corporate clients.”

Ian Kerr, CEO of Bolero International, added: “This partnership is a very exciting development for all at Bolero. We are proud to have forged this partnership with such a progressive and highly respected institution as SABB. This is also a testament to Bolero’s dedication to revolutionising world trade through digitisation and improving corporate efficiency. Bolero has cultivated strong working relationships with many banks and we very much look forward to developing our partnership with SABB.”

The post SABB to be first bank in Saudi Arabia to offer digitised trade solutions appeared first on International Finance.