The event in Amsterdam was a great couple of days, bringing some great minds in the industry together for the first time since the pandemic. bancon were proud to sponsor the event and attend in person. Co-Founder Jörg Mauelshagen and Brad Jarrett, Group Director, Financial Services went along and enjoyed seeing some familiar faces as well as meeting some new ones. With a jam-packed agenda they had a busy schedule from conference workshops to talks hosted by SAP & SAP Fioneer customers across a breadth of hot industry topics, and managed to fit in a few networking lunches and dinners too.
We asked them to narrow down their best bits to five highlights that both Jörg and Brad took a lot of inspiration and new ideas from;
1.
The first session we joined was ‘Innovating Digital and Core Banking through Technology’ which was very relevant topic for bancon, taking place over half a day. Hosted by our SAP Fioneer partners Marcin Krawiec and Dr. Christoph G. Rösch who set out their new ‘banking editions’ strategy which will enable swifter deployments targeted towards specific banking segments - retail, commercial and asset leasing. The SAP Fioneer team then presented their SaaS offering Cloud4Banking. Maria Cazares and Lloyd King did a great job with a real-time demo that really resonated with clients in the room. We have both seen this demo plenty of times but it never fails to impress.
2.
Meeting friends from LATAM & North America DYCSI, Joe Torres, Carlos Bonilla and Carlos Gonzalez Bejarano in person had to be our second highlight. After speaking with them virtually for a number of years it was so great to meet them in person. Working for a global company it is wonderful to have friends across the world, a chance to learn from each other and draw inspiration from all four corners of the globe to enhance and inspire our own strategies. It is always a pleasure to spend time with likeminded individuals and we made time to discuss how we can strengthen our partnership through closer collaboration and continued knowledge sharing once we leave Amsterdam – plenty more to come.
3.
bancon have worked closely with SAP Fioneer on their Transactional Core Banking offering since its foundational release so we joined the session presented by Ramakrishnan TV in which he set out the vision for the product. The main takeaway for us was how, through cloud modernisation, the future ready product offers clients an even more flexible, real-time, API enabled and scalable core backend. Through the newly announced SAP Fioneer Sandbox, clients will be able to get their hands-on pre-delivered content covering end-to-end banking processes, enabling them to experience SAP Fioneer product suite ahead of any potential purchase. Brad commented “bancon have collaborated with SAP Fioneer on the development of much of what was very well presented by Ramki. It was a proud moment to see the product in action for the first time, and get such a positive reaction from the room of respected colleagues.”
4.
Of course, these events are always great for catching up with old friends and making new ones. It was great to see former colleague Dac Nguyen from Lloyds Bank and find out about their latest internal projects and plans. We had a great discussion with SAP’s Annemarie van Der Welle about her banking focus and aligned opinions. We had a chance to catch up with partners Accenture and partners MSG, to get the latest updates on their 2023 plans. We also made some new friends from management and technology consultancy bearing point, who we look forward to keeping in touch with back at the office.
5.
The conference agenda was so good that it was hard to decide what to attend. However, we were both keen not to miss guest speaker Brett King on ‘The Future of Everything’. The topic covered how crypto might look in 2050 and the rise of techno-socialism, and the impact it could have on banking. Brett predicts a seismic shift in the way we think about economics, assets and money. The world’s largest economies will become ‘smart economies’ driven by high levels of immersive technology and automation integrated into everyday life. Without blending social responsibility with this automation, businesses won’t be able to compete and it is certainly a lasting thought for us, as we are sure it was for the other attendees.
Events like these always remind us that taking time out of the office or away from your home desk brings a new way of thinking, new voices and opinions and a chance to keep learning.
