Signzy expects rapid digital KYC growth in Middle East from Seed Group partnership

Signzy’s integrated biometric video KYC solution and other digital transformation tools can reduce digital transformation cycles for financial institutions from six to nine months down to three or four weeks, the company’s Co-founder and CEO said during a recent interview.

Digital transformation often takes banks six to nine months, and requires compliance to be coordinated among the many partners financial institutions traditionally need to carry out digital transformation, from frontend app developers to back-end office systems, APIs to KYC underwriters.

CEO Ankit Ratan joined the company’s strategic partner Seed Group to discuss their collaborative plans in the United Arab Emirates, and how Signzy can help banks achieve a positive return on their investment with what he says are low upfront costs and short development cycles.

The challenges financial institutions face in carrying out digital transformation, and the need for a single platform to implement change, prompted Signzy to build a specialized banking automation solution. Large-scale automation of bank-end systems could change the ratio of bank employees from around two-thirds in the backend and one-third directly helping customers, to the reverse, Ratan says.

The Signzy platform aggregates around 200 API services for its 200 financial service customers, helping them to onboard a combined 5 million consumers each month.

The risks that sometimes accompany new technology adoption, such as in regulatory compliance, are mitigated with Signzy, the CEO says. He advises financial institutions to consider both compliance and user experience as they set up their processes.

Ratan claims Signzy has “best in the world” image and video fraud detection.

Signzy is expanding its market footprint in the Middle East, after establishing a presence in Dubai, and has gained “early traction” in the North American market, Ratan says. The partnership with Seed Group will help Signzy reach large and mid-sized banks in the Middle East, as well as fintech, Ratan says, because of the close alignment of the partner’s goals, and Seed Group’s reputation as a regional partner. From there, Signzy may extend into the ecommerce and travel markets.

The discussion also touched on security, and how Ratan believes Seed Group’s market position in the Middle East will increase both Signzy’s reach and conversions, accelerating the growth of its digital KYC and onboarding platform.

The partnership was announced in a blog post in August, with the intention of accelerating businesses’ digital transformation across the UAE.

“The UAE is taking giant strides to meet the objectives of the UAE Digital Government Strategy 2025 and double the size of the digital economy in the next 10 years. Businesses are going through a phenomenal digital transformation and are on the lookout to adopt affordable smart technologies,” Hisham Al Gurg, chief executive of Seed Group, said at the time.

A white paper published last month by the Global Assured Identity Network urged organizations performing digital KYC checks, like financial institutions, to take on the role of digital identity providers.

Article Topics

AI  |  automation  |  banking  |  biometrics  |  digital identity  |  financial services  |  fraud prevention  |  identity verification  |  KYC  |  Middle East  |  onboarding  |  Signzy