Speaker Interview- Dr. Bongani Andy Mabaso

HOME / Speaker Interview- Dr. Bongani Andy Mabaso

Dr. Bongani Andy Mabaso is the current Chief Information Officer at Standard Bank, South Africa.

He strongly believes and loves the continent of Africa and is self-motivated to change the world at large.

Dr. Bongani, is a seasoned change agent with a cumulative experience of over 12 years, which includes his past experience at Transnet Engineering. He is a passionate driver of digital change.

Dr. Bongani Andy Mabaso will be speaking virtually at Finnovex Southern Africa Summit. Please have a look at his view on our upcoming Leading Summit on Financial Services Innovation and Excellence held Virtually on 27th – 28th July 2021 💻🖥📱 )



Q- As we are aware, Banking services and Financial Institutions will need to act fast to create a robust framework, to survive in the post COVID-19 era. What is your opinion on investing in a digital future and developing new technological solutions?

COVID-19 has had the unforeseen impact of accelerating digital transformation for many businesses, but particularly in the financial services industry. Clients now expect digital interactions to be smoother, more seamless, and even delightful. Financial services industries will need to accelerate their transformation agendas responsibly (in light of revenues that were severely impacting in many cases by the pandemic) – and they need to do it quickly.



Q- How can the collaboration within FinTech’s and Traditional Banks be fostered?

Innovation is often a highly networked phenomenon – the more ideas are free to flow from everyone and everywhere, including from fintech partners, preferably the one that can lead to a great deal of positive client impact. So, I think the innovation models that the banks use needs to be more open to allowing partners to engage in the process.



Q- Why do you think it is important to build and enforce a Cashless Economy where digital lending and online payments would be incorporated?

The reason to drive a cashless economy is widely documented and understood, so I won’t repeat that. What I can say is the opportunity is there, and we are seeing movements in this space across the industry.



Q-In the applications of AI, Machine Learning and other Immersive Technologies, can you state 3 limited factors within the Southern Africa?

I will speak briefly on AI since that is a field, I am familiar with. Funny enough, I think the biggest challenge those financial institutions face when it comes to AI is not the models themselves, but the data to support various data science initiatives.

Firstly, organisational data is not generally in a state where it can be easily exploited and used to drive personalisation and cross/up-sell. It tends to contain errors, lies in various siloed systems, and is controlled by various business owners who sit within product lines, thereby creating barriers for data scientists. This needs to change!

Secondly, I’m not so sure that the typical organisational response to the problem above, you know, the centralisation of data into lakes and other such constructs, is necessarily the best answer for the problem. Centralising data in this way tends to come from people who believe it is an asset (it is rightfully so!). But we tend to want to horde something that is an asset. I think people should rather treat data as a product. Treating it this way means we tend to want to find ways to exploit it right now, and use it for the benefit of our clients and organisation. Hence, I think a combination of modern data strategy and business ethos of exploitation, as opposes to centralisation, will greatly drive the efforts to commercialise AI and data driven applications in the industry.