Tech Tuesday: The Future of the Mobile Wallet
Scarlett Sieber
Chief Strategy & Growth Officer, Money20/20. Contributor, Forbes. Author. International Speaker. Board Member.
Meet Abrar Mir, digital payments and mobile banking pioneer. As an international executive, Abrar has paved the way for the future of banking in South Asia and beyond. Abrar has led organizations in winning many global awards from the likes of GSMA, Global Finance, IDC etc. Currently, Abrar is Chief Innovation & Financial inclusion officer at Habib Bank Limited (HBL). Having been around since 1941, longer than the country of Pakistan itself, HBL is the largest commercial bank in Pakistan and the largest domestic multinational bank with a global presence in over 20 countries spanning across four continents.
In his role as CIO & CFIO, Abrar has a keen interest in finding ways to leverage the evolving digital technology to significantly expand financial inclusion in a financially viable and sustainable manner. As such, Abrar and his team have created the ability for customers to do complete digital on-boarding where customers can walk away with a new account (or mobile wallet) within minutes, enabling an entire population to now formally become part of financial systems.
#TechTuesday Highlight #22: Abrar Ahmed Mir, Chief Innovation & Financial Inclusion Officer at Habib Bank Limited
How/why did you get into your space?
I got into this space in 2008 because I believed Mobile and Data were going to transform the way we live and financial services could not escape that. The way to really scale up in my view has always been to create a truly pervasive mobile based payment system that brings a strong value proposition for customers to adopt the service. I chose to walk away from stable regular banking roles and venture into this unknown space with many detractors and naysayers around and literally no one with any belief in the idea. That’s what gives me the kick and that’s what I have thoroughly enjoyed over the last decade in this space.
What role do you play in the tech ecosystem and why is that role important?
I initiated the concept of having development teams as part of business teams instead of the traditional role of being in IT function. That has enabled me to quickly design and deliver many new business ideas and experiment and discard a few others quickly based on the need of clients. I have been able to design and deliver on some very large scale G2P projects in a matter of days and won global recognition at GSMA for some of those achievements. I have also been able to create a first of its kind truly digital bank within an existing commercial bank in the absence of a separate regulation for digital only bank in our market.
How has technology impacted your industry and why is this important?
Like all the other industries, technology is inevitably impacting our industry. Although, I believe the really scaled up, truly transformational impact is yet to materialize. Regulations have a major role to play in the pace of this transformation but I believe as more tech based KYC and monitoring and authentication solutions mature and can deliver at speed and scale, the pace of transformation will greatly increase. Technology is extremely important as it is reshaping the way we live and interact with each other, the way we expect to engage with service providers and the way we consume services. Unless we adapt and redefine our business models, our services and move away from being a product organizations to customer centric structure, we shall not be relevant in times to come.
What do you believe is the most exciting tech trend for 2019 (as it relates to your industry)?
I think a huge focus on data and AI are the obvious ones. Increasing talk of Open API and ecosystem / platform play are also very exciting conversations with the possibility of completely transforming the business model and industry forever.
Who is a person that inspires you?
Two people: Bill Gates for his philanthropy to make this world a better place to live. And Steve Jobs for his confidence/arrogance that customers don’t know what they want so create it and they will begin to want it like they had been waiting for it forever.
What advice would you give for someone who wants to get into tech?
Don’t be distracted by naysayers, have the guts to think wild and big, find inspirations from other industries, other business models and most of all be passionate, committed and charge ahead with full confidence and self belief...good things WILL happen sooner or later.
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Have thoughts on this week’s trends or questions for me or Abrar? Post your thoughts in the comment section or share them on Twitter. Please include the hashtag #techtuesday and mention me @ScarlettSieber! Until next week. ??
You can connect with Abrar on LinkedIn.
#innovate #CustomerExperience #Tech #TechTuesday #finance #banks #mobile #data #fintech #digitalbanks #mobilewallet #financialinclusion
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Want more insights from the movers and shakers of the tech industry?
Read past #techtuesday articles:
CEO at BSI, Partner at a Power Consultancy Group Partner at a Legal Consultancy Group Represent Meinhardt Group
5 年Interesting
PM/PMO/Oracle Utilities Consultant - Technology Consulting - EY
5 年Naveed Hussain Khichi, PMP, PMI-ACP?Mustafa Haroon?Danish Hasan, PMP, ITIL V3?Syed Owais Wasti
Head of product development | Payments | Cards | Digital lending
5 年Great article. Abrar M.