Meanwhile, innovators like Ant Financial(China) and M-Pesa(Kenya) are leveraging high mobile penetration rates in emerging markets, and are beginning to experiment with cross-border money transfers. Western Union is doing that. Salesforce has a value proposition that was immediately interesting because it allows you to build a single omnichannel journey that can be managed really efficiently when I want to make a change I only need to do so in one place. Talends technology has been used similarly in response to people impacted by floods in Haiti and to Indian citizens at the height of the countrys COVID-19 crisis. Denver, Colorado. Salesforce has been such an important part of the digital experience journey.. The central transformation team helps do the capability building in training those resources up, and then they run their own scaled-out deployment. But for all its success, Western Union is undoubtedly a legacy player in a market that has been truly disrupted in recent years, with smaller and more agile outfits making waves in the increasingly digitised payments space. From the CEO down through his executive team, you see a real commitment to this transformation exercise and a real commitment to finding ways to optimize our processes, to get efficiencies, and to fund those investments that will drive topline revenue growth. [2]But today, new technologies are threatening Western Unions entire business model. The resulting report, How to Win in the Data Economy, includes anecdotes from dozens of customers, analysts, and influencers about how to succeed, all in addition to the survey itself, based on feedback from 1,000 senior business, technology, and data managers across five industries and from all over the world. Meeting the moment with solutions required Western Union to accelerate its own digital transformation. - Access cash back rewards at the WU store. Safety starts with understanding how developers collect and share your data. We recently delivered a similar requirement to a higher standard using one OutSystems developer in just 15 days. Continue to partner with popular digital platforms to provide legacy C2C money transfer services. (PDF-165 KB) The transformation of a legacy company whose roots lie in the era of the telegraph involves more than just lean deployments and agile methodologies. On May 17, 2018, at the Digital Assembly in Sofia, Bulgaria, the European Commission launched the Digital Agenda for the Western Balkans. According to the terms of the transaction . One of its most high-profile hires was Harveer Singh, who was appointed as Chief Data Architect & Global Head of Engineering and previously co-led EYs Next Generation architecture & solutions for Financial Services. Secure, touchless, digital money transfers were a safe, reliable way for people to send funds where they needed to, so we leaned in there. We believe in the work we do, why we do it, and who we hire to get it done. But it becomes more self-driven, and that really enables the scale. Complete your profile for personalized recommendations, Managing Director, U.S. Financial Services at Google. Procurement & Construction, Financial Professors from HEC, ESCP business school, and leading carriers shared insights on . Digital transformation in the EUBenefitting people, the economy and the environment. We developed the whole front-end for the app in less than four months., Western Union uses OutSystems for customer-facing apps, back office, and workflow solutions. . Arab Emirates. Some want to go to a retail store and pay cash. Technology or Operations transformation . Convera. DENVER-(BUSINESS WIRE)-The Western Union Company (NYSE: WU), a global leader in cross-border, cross-currency money movement and payments, today announced that the Company has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire a minority stake in fast growing Saudi Digital Payments Company, or stc pay, a fully owned subsidiary of Saudi Telecom Company. My team and I had thought of the future being digital, of course, but the pandemic really forced us to make it a reality for the business. Whats really nice about that is that its so visually obvious. These agents typically manage retail stores across the world, and offer Western Union money transfer services in exchange for a commission. Build customized, secure, and scalable mobile banking apps. 1 (March 1990), pp. It requires a change in process and culture, the adoption of a common lingo, executive buy-in, and a center of excellence to ensure enterprise-wide success. Finally, shareholders may punish Western Union for moving away from its higher margin core business to focus instead on simpler, lower-cost digital money transfers. As weve done that, everyone has started to speak the same language, whether its talking about going to huddles, doing process confirmations, conducting one-on-one coaching, or maybe doing floor walks. Business Unit Represents Approximately 7% of Company Revenue . Filipino workers abroad), they need to bring physical money somewhere, and most of the fintech companies in remittance space dont have their own channels (they often partner with local kiosks). With my work with WEF, I was lucky enough to sit around a table recently with some important people and talk about how we can take this forward. Digital transformation starts with people, which is a useful reminder that . Migrants, who typically are the link between cash economies underserved by financial institutions, and highly bancarized, digital economies, benefit from Western Unions unique ability to combine the physical and the digital. One of the benefits that weve really seen as weve gone through these first two years of our journey is what happens when we get everyone speaking the same language. Increasingly, digital technology and mobile devices play a key role in these transactions. An undisputed leader in the global payments space, Western Union is driving a company-wide technology transformation, underpinned by migrating its infrastructure from on-prem to the cloud. Western Union has had a compound annual growth rate above 25 percent over the past five years, since the launch of the digital division. Institute, Infosys Innovation We saw that our revenue and customer base didnt reflect the opportunity and size of the market.. Western Union must adapt to an increasingly mobile world: if Western Union doesn't develop low-cost mobile money transfers, Western Union won't be able to compete . Head of Information Technology & Digital Transformation Econet Wireless Zimbabwe Oct 2015 - Present 7 years 6 months. Youre expected to find ways to optimize your processes and drive value. The Foundation is supported by the Western Union Company, its employees, Agents, and business partners, working to support education and disaster relief efforts as pathways toward a better future. It is our responsibility to enable businesses, problem solvers, regulators and communities to leverage fintech for the betterment of lives. Weve been able to increase the amount and frequency of relevant data we can share with our agents, and they have started to build new processes based on that. However, Western Union would be wise to form a new, separate unit for exploring blockchain services. In just 11 months, we delivered a full-service digital banking experience that expands our relationship with customers.. The pilots help get buy-in across the organization, and then once we have that buy-in, it provides the resources necessary to scale. Finance. Board Committees. Our technology platform is founded on a Hadoop big data technology cluster that is used for conversion analysis, risk statistical modeling, payments and risk data processing, Fellahi explains. In the latest step in its digital journey, Western Union recently launched a bot that enables Facebook Messenger users in the United States to send money to more than 200 countries, across 130 currencies, from within the messaging app. And when that happens, they start to see further opportunities for continuous improvement, leading them to new ideas about things they can do to improve efficiency or effectiveness. One moment later, in Shimla, a hill country city in India, close to the ridge of the Himalayan foothills, a cashier at the . Western Union (NYSE: WU), a global leader in cross-border, cross-currency money movement and payments and Zain Cash, the award-winning mobile financia . While WU is considered a global leader in their space, competitive insights and . Western Union can leverage such physical presence to win this new innovative space. He also praises Snowflakes adaptability when it came to dealing with huge capacity increases. Here are 4 steps they follow, Why durable solutions are needed to build the future of audiences, A data-privacy team can support your privacy transformation. When people send money to friends or family across the country or around the world, chances are good that Western Union is involved. There were definitely times I was looking at costs and thinking how I was going to explain to finance, or my CFO, he says. As mobile payments and blockchain tech challenge the status quo of cross-border money transfers, Western Union must digitally transform itself at the right pace or risk going the way of the telegraph. My mission is to empower people to become economically self-reliant. A lot of our big data environment is still on-prem and the mission is to move that completely to the cloud by the end of the year. Western Union's stock price continued to climb the week of April 12 reaching $25.89, compared to a low of $21.66 in January. The company wanted to improve the digital experiences offered to customers and build new digital bankingproducts to extend its relationship with customers. We started function by function, looking at individual deployments across our different groups in the company. Wingspan, Infosys Western Union's digital services align with the UAE government's policy to create an economy driven by innovation and technology," said Salma Massoud, head of digital, Middle East and Africa . Having found great success with its Marketing Cloud, Singh outlines his longer-term vision to connect a number of Western Unions central products. One of these customers is Tom Mazzaferro, Chief Data & Innovation Officer of Western Union, which serves more than 100 million global customers through approximately 600,000 retail locations, and via its digital platforms. But you say its about more than technology? Our digital-first crisis response is helping us evolve into the future. Services, Data They essentially sponsor a team and loan the resources that are necessary. of Use, Payment Media, Madison Square Entertainment, Professional Learn about JSON storage. Assignment: Driving Digital Transformation, AIG & Cyber Insurance Learning to Insure a Digital World, The First Transcontinental Telegram was sent to DC 155 Years Ago, Form 10-K for the year ended December 2017, How Blockchain Could Help Emerging Markets Leap Ahead, Beyond the Hype: What Blockchain could mean for Africa, Western Union is Testing Ripple and XRP for Money Transfers, Western Union Brings Money Transfer and Its Tricky Fees to Chat Apps, Emirates NBD, an almost perfect digital transformation, B2B business solutions (cross-border and cross-currency). Poland followed later in 2022, while plans are at hand to launch Italy by the end of the year. SEED aims to improve education and employability of students from low socio-economic backgrounds, especially children of refugees, migrants, and local families. How Western Union achieved Digital Transformation with Infosys and Oracle. There was a need to accelerate the process we wanted to undertake, I have that experience of transformation projects happening on a massive scale. It's a physical branding and marketing component that few money-transfer providers can match but one that's of diminishing value in a digital world. Thats not to say cloud is always cheap, it can be expensive but we have a very stringent Review Board to keep our costs in check, so cost reduction is something about which we are confident.. Western Union is a global leader in cross-border, cross-currency money movement and payments. We have a lot of great ideas in terms of investments to drive that topline revenue growth, but we needed ways to fund those. So we established a set of what we call market-shaper practices that we wanted to focus on. They can include creating strategy placemats (one-page strategy overviews that are easily shared), frequent team huddles, one-on-one coaching, and process confirmation. He shares his views on digital transformation and economic opportunities for all. As the transformation gets embedded into the organization, the businesses start to run their own agile deployments. Singh was given autonomy to mould his teams, combining the skills already at Western Union with external talent, many of which were from a consulting background, resulting in a diverse and varied team, which he says proved invaluable. "As users turn to our services in bigger numbers and as many new digital players come to the market, we know we have to change," he says. We embrace the white canvas and first principles design, breaking away from legacy systems to create smart . Theyve complemented each other really well and been able to almost mentor each other, as well as building great relationships with the product groups. For example, in 2016 Western Union integrated money transfer options with messanging apps WeChat and Viber, allowing users to send small amounts of money through the apps. Reflecting on the transformation to-date, Singh is clear that it hasnt come without its challenges. This is just one example of how blockchain could be an opportunity for Western Union. Join us to learn how your organization can become a leader in the Data Economy and the business benefits that result. Leading fintech, Mambu, provides the platform and engine that drives the core of Western Union's new digital bank.