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“Back at Halyk we thought about a digital banking project for some time. For an incumbent player like Halyk, launching such a project is no easy task. For this reason, presenting the Altyn Bank case to the parent bank was both easy and difficult at the same time. It was easy since Halyk was mentally ready for such a project. What was difficult to come up with was a clear projection and financial model. Nonetheless, the acquisition of Altyn presented rare opportunities – a clear IT landscape, affluent retail clientele and a limited branch network.”

Altyn Bank is part of Halyk Group, the largest financial group in Kazakhstan. Active in the market since 1998 as a universal commercial bank, it is the largest subsidiary of Halyk Bank, serving 600+ corporate clients and 75,000 individual customers. In late 2014, Halyk Bank acquired HSBC Bank Kazakhstan when HSBC decided to leave the country. They subsequently renamed it Altyn Bank. The bank faced a challenging separation scenario, with the need to become independent from legacy systems and old parent infrastructure from day one. While this created some problems for the bank, it also presented an opportunity to start its digital journey from scratch.

In just a few months preceding the acquisition, Halyk prepared the basic infrastructure, including core banking systems and an off-the-shelf internet banking solution. As soon as the transition period ended, Altyn Bank’s team began to draft project requirements and strategize in a very clever way. Innovative and collaborative ways of working were used to make each customer touchpoint better, faster, and more efficient. A cross-functional team brought in skills from across the organization. A disciplined ‘test and learn’ approach and new metrics were used so progress was measured against clear wins, like growth in new-customer sign-ups.

Digitally onboarding 10,000 clients in less than 9 months

Askar S. SmagulovCEO, Altyn Bank

Backbase as the right digital banking solution

At the time, Altyn Bank was working with a leading consultancy company who helped to create both the digital bank architecture and a roadplan. Backbase’s digital platform was among a dozen systems endorsed by the consultancy

Backbase is on a mission to empower financial institutions to accelerate their digital transformation and effectively compete in a digital-first world.Get to know more at: www.backbase.comSeamless Experiences, Delivered

Backbase Case Study 2/2

company and was the one chosen by the bank. The idea, as always, was to make customers’ banking experiences more convenient, easy and engaging, by adopting an omni-channel approach. This led to the creation of the Altyn-i digital bank project. Altyn-i was underpinned by the Backbase omni-channel digital banking platform, and offered a full range of financial services, such as 24/7 banking services, account opening, debit cards, deposits, payment services and automated credit approvals. To enhance these services, the bank mapped the client journey from beginning to end.

Fast product integration for complex systems

“We didn’t know Backbase very well at that point in time,” says Askar S. Smagulov. It was only after we finished the project and launched that we fully appreciated the value of the Backbase platform.” Altyn Bank achieved everything they expected to, and within 6-7 months. Backbase was a part of this huge project, which encompassed 12 IT systems and third party integrations. In their own words, the bank had “achieved the impossible”.

Customer base migration to Backbase

“What we’ve created is like a bank within a bank. We’ve handled the digital bank under a separate engine – and even with the retail customers we currently have, there are three types of customer: fully digital (which sits on Backbase); hybrid customers who hold accounts that are still digital, but are old accounts in our traditional retail banking; then we have traditional customers who use branches and a different type of internet banking. We are making strategic decisions on how to migrate the whole retail customer base to digital banking, which means fully using the Backbase solution.”

Digitally onboarding 10,000 clients in less than 9 months

It has been difficult to comparatively measure the success of Altyn Bank’s digital strategy, as they launched from scratch, but their target of onboarding 5,000 clients in the first nine months was doubled to 10,000. In addition to this, Askar S. Smagulov recognizes that they took more than mere numbers from this transformation experience. They did not simply implement new technology, the bank changed the way retail business was done.

“Among the things we encountered in preparing for the launch was the fact that we knew we had to grow our own base of IT specialists,” he says. “Backbase is doing the right thing by creating an ecosystem around itself – with many partners and certified specialists. This helps companies grow, and has helped us grow in so many ways. We believe Backbase will not only help with technology, but in our business approach too.”

Backbase and Altyn ahead together

Altyn Bank continues to go from strength to strength, having embraced digital transformation, and having had the advantage of a “clear IT landscape”. In addition, they recognized the benefit of technical and business expertise when it comes to choosing the right digital partner and this has been key to their success and their positive outlook for the future.