HLB LAUNCHPAD ACTIVATE 2018

A. Trade finance marketplace

Currently, trade finance and trade credit products are available to SMEs but few leverages on this form of credit facility due to the immense amount of paper work and long application procedures.

Create a platform that is all encompassing of all players in the trade finance field (financial institutions, credit rating agencies, SMEs, insurance companies etc). The platform would act as a marketplace that would enable SMEs to provide their commercial agreements (trade finance opportunity) while trader financiers would be able to list their product terms and offerings. This would enable a matching of demand and supply and enable greater cash flow movement in the SME market.

It'll be best for this solution to utilise blockchain technology.

B. SME credit evaluation and underwriting

Banks evaluate SME credit worthiness based on their audited financial statements. This becomes an issue when SMEs do not have audited financial statements. As the current processes do not have channels that provide an alternative source of data credit evaluation, it becomes difficult for applicants without the exact credit documentation to be provided a loan.

Develop a solution for banks to leverage on new data sources (e.g., social media or other data sources ) to act as an alternative option to evaluate an SME's credit worthiness.

C. Business and Finance platform

As the SME businesses are highly diversified, many of the off-the-shelf solutions provided to SMEs are general and not tailored to their needs.

Create an integrated solution that would enable banks to provide customisable solutions to address the needs of SMEs (based on their current business size, stage of growth and industry). The solution should also include value added services to enable the success of the business such as business management, HR solutions, financial management etc.

A. Retail customer credit evaluation

Current credit underwriting process only relies on information provided by each loan applicant and their credit file to assess if the applicant meets the minimum loan criteria. The current process do not have channels that provides an alternative source of data credit evaluation, hence, making it difficult for applicants without the exact credit documentation to be provided a loan.

Develop a solution for banks to leverage on new data sources (e.g., social media or other data sources ) to act as an alternative option to evaluate an applicant's credit worthiness.

A. Real time robo-advisor

Consumers are looking for more accurate channels for investment advice. This involves real time and data driven advices.

Create an automated robo advisor that is able to provide real time advices or trading strategies that takes into consideration of our customers risk profile to guide them in investment planning utilising algorithm-driven asset allocation to balance their portfolios. The solution should be able to provide real-time recommendations that reflects their investment goals, trading history and external market events. The robo-advisor would also be able to capture real time pricing (loan rates, brokerage rates and deposit rates etc) and predict any movements in the pricing.

B. Personal finance manager

There is a need to educate consumers to manage their personal finances.

Work to create a comprehensive personal finance tool that would educate consumers on how to manage their finances. The tool should have features such as the basic budget management to life stage finances (e.g., family planning, home ownership, marriage, pregnancy, children education, retirement and tax planning).

C. Financial data validator

Today, as an investor, there are a lot of investment reports, recommendations and news from various sources. It can be confusing and overwhelming. It is also difficult to verify the authenticity and validity of these information and sources.

Create a solution that is based on algorithms to check the authenticity and accuracy of the information online.

A. Digital customer data

In retail banking, daily interaction with customers is part of our daily operations. There could be many situations whereby friction with customers occur. Today, many banks uses traditional customer survey methods (e-mails, web forms, SMSes, social media) to collect data on customer's sentiments. However, this approach is highly dependent on customers response on the survey causing lag in data collection response time.

Create a solution to enable HLB to capture customer's sentiments real time to help better understand our customers and respond real time. This solution should enable HLB to gain real time data and to gain immediate insights of any friction with customers. Focus on using a non-invasive survey method to gather customer sentiment and feedback (e.g. via facial recognition, emotion recognition, body language recognition, machine vision, etc) to collect customer sentiment data.

B. Customer Analytics and Insights Generation

Banks have multiple channels to collect customer's sentiments (e-mails, web forms, SMSes, social media). Despite having data on customers feedbacks, it is difficult for banks to process the immense amount of data real time and capture insights real time to react on time. It is also challenging to identify keywords that signals an extremely distressed customers accurately.

Work on a solution to help analyse customers feedback data from multiple channels and generate useful insights to enable the bank to react on time and accurately.

C. One stop finance and investment platform

It is quite common for a customer to have multiple bank accounts (current and savings account, loan, investment and credit card accounts).

Develop an interactive digital ecosystem or API that integrates all of the bank's offerings and services into an interactive one stop platform (includes savings, investments, robo-advisory, insurers, etc) to create a seamless experience for banking customers. This solution should also enable customers to merge all their bank accounts to a single platform to ease the management of their finances.

D. IoT data collection

As we move to becoming a connected society, it is vital for banks to leverage and play a role in the growing connected market. This would enable banks to have better insights into customer behaviours and buying habits.

Develop a solution to enable banks to collect data from IoT devices in financial industries to enable better data analysis to make better financial decisions. The solution must be secured and does not violate any privacy or security breaches.

E. Solving Parking Problems

Banks have multiple branches in commercial areas and shop houses where parking is scarce. This creates a lot of inconveniences for our banking customers to drive to the branches to perform their banking transactions.

Come up with a solution to make it easy and hassle free for our customers to come to our branches.

F. Home buyers financial tool

Buying a property can be a daunting and confusing experience especially for first time home buyers.

Create a platform that can assist home buyers to understand the buying process, perform a financial credit evaluation of their own finances to determine their affordability and match houses to their affordability. The platform should also provide images, videos or public feedback on the property on social media. Buyers should also be able to compare pricing, properties as well as bank loan rates and put in an application on the platform seamlessly.

A. Anti-money laundering platform

The financial services industry is a highly regulated industry and is always cautious of money laundering activities. Thus, every bank is required to perform Anti Money Laundering (AML) due diligence when processing transfers.

Come up with a solution that leverages on a universal international platform and infrastructure. This solution is meant to assist banks to perform AML checks quicker without causing any delays to customers and do not require banks to engage customers for additional information that would cause unnecessary friction.