It took six months to do the bare minimum. We teach employees, and then they execute. The Western Union Way of digital transformation. document.getElementById( "ak_js_1" ).setAttribute( "value", ( new Date() ).getTime() ); Want to learn more about technology and organizations? As the centerpiece of Western Unions omnichannel vision, the Western Union App is increasingly the primary touchpoint for customers: today more than 65% of Western Unions digital transactions originate on a mobile device globally. Transfers can be delivered in cash or into a digital wallet or a bank account via electronic funds transfer. And when you have that, it becomes easier to have a stronger level of influence than you might otherwise expect with a small team, because everyone in the organization is clear that, whether youre working directly with the WU Way team or not, your job is to find ways for continuous improvement. The top challenge for businesses with digital transformation goals in 2023 is determining where their companies should direct spending on technologies, according to a BCG X report. The Baupost Group is a $31 billion Boston-based investment firm. That means we can onboard new developers and have them productive much faster, and weve got fewer knowledge silos in the development team., Moreover, low-code development on OutSystems helps Tom fight back in the war for digital talent. Download the Western Union (WU) money transfer app and quickly start sending cash to Mexico and worldwide, 24/7! How Western Union Became a Global Digital Front-Runner for Cross-Border Payments Money By Jay Jaffin, Head of Global Digital, Western Union May 24, 2021. Behind those market-shaper practices are the lean tools and behaviors we develop and encourage. Faced with numerous applications to deliver, the need to rapidly iterate customer experiences, and the steep learning curve for new Cloud DevOps toolchains, Western Union decided to evaluate low-code platforms. Build customized, secure, and scalable mobile banking apps. Data quality is so important to us, we need to know who we are marketing to and that means our data has to be of the highest quality.. One of our most important tools is the floor walk. My Career Summary Anil Santhapuri is a values-based and results-oriented Talent professional, with 20 years of professional experience in the areas of talent management, learning & leadership development. I have successfully directed virtual teams working on Mastercard integrations, Western Union and MoneyGram. The second aspect is our agile work, where we spin up teams that have learned and are now experts in using agile methodologies for product launches or IT development. de 2007 - actualidad16 aos 3 meses. The fusion of the digital and the physical, the irrepressible rise of new technologies. With OutSystems, we deploy twice every week. Western Union also is uniquely positioned to explore blockchain applications in emerging markets by leveraging Western Unions retail footprint, regulatory compliance learning, and global brand. 1 (March 1990), pp. Reflecting on the transformation to-date, Singh is clear that it hasnt come without its challenges. The pandemic really accelerated the digital transformation journey; the plan was for it to be rolled out in three years but that timeframe became 18 months. Beyond the public health crisis, COVID-19 has had a devastating impact on personal finances, causing poverty levels and inequality to rise globally. Contributed to establishing Quality Assurance, Training and Documentation strategy and processes for AML Operations functions. So we had to figure out how to continue to show up for customers while also ensuring everyones health and safely. Having found great success with its Marketing Cloud, Singh outlines his longer-term vision to connect a number of Western Unions central products. Whats really nice about that is that its so visually obvious. Western Union will likely face internal resistance from three sources. Top-down prioritization of digital transformation. Tom Mazzaferro, Chief Data Officer at Western Union together with Nick Halsey, CEO at Okera talk about the technology that Western Union has adopted to help build new products and Western Union, Chief Data Officer: Digital Transformation Initiatives (Part 3) | Cloud | cdomagazine.tech We caught up with Mazzaferro to dive deeper into how the Data Cloud enables ongoing digital . Digital transformation in the EUBenefitting people, the economy and the environment. Digital transformation can refer to anything from IT modernization (for example, cloud computing), to digital optimization, to the invention of new digital business models. 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. Driving Western Union's tech transformation - Digital Bulletin However, Western Union doesnt view its established retail business as totally separate from the digital world. Arvie de Vera - LinkedIn Nov 2011 - Present11 years 5 months. 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. Arab Emirates. For decades, Western Union has defended its global position by investing in regulatory compliance. How Western Union achieved Digital Transformation with Infosys and Oracle. Western Union charges high fees since they need to cover rent and labor overhead. Becoming digital first meant we needed to deliver fast, frictionless experiences, especially on mobile. And that could be at an operation site or it could be more of a frontline thing like a sales executive. To learn more about the data economy, what your organization stands to gain from using data effectively, and how to become a Data Economy Leader, download the report overview, How to Win in Todays Data Economy. Enterprise Technology Operations Center Manager. [1] One hundred years later, Western Union launched the first domestic commercial geostationary satellite (Westar 1). Digital transformation in the EU | News | European Parliament . The organisation was looking for somebody with a fresh perspective who could challenge the norms, bring people together to show them the value of what were doing and basically create an environment thats a little bit different to your usual corporate set-up. The aim of this paper is to sketch a brief history of complex digital transformation of media and . Its reach is staggering: present in more than 200 countries and territories, transacting in 130+ currencies, with approximately 150 million people having used Western Union to either send or receive funds over the last year. Solutions enabled - Oracle Revenue Management and Billing, Oracle Business Intelligence, Infosys Transaction Reconciliation System, Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Solution and Services, Infosys Oracle Services, part of Infosys Cobalt. However, Western Union would be wise to form a new, separate unit for exploring blockchain services. Top retailers use AI-powered campaigns to engage their most valuable customers. For example, helping African countries develop official land registers could eliminate a huge barrier to investment and capital inflows (e.g., by resolving uncertain and disputed land titles). [7]For a helpful overview of how Blockchain is being used in emerging markets, see Vinay Gupta & Rob Knight, How Blockchain Could Help Emerging Markets Leap Ahead, Harvard Business Review, May 17, 2017. Please enable Javascript to see this feature. Youre now a year into your role as CMO and leading through a prolonged global crisis. Western Union built its platform by assembling a global network of third party agents. . Swanback said a . My role was to bring all of these different teams together and instil a culture that recognised it wasnt just about how fast we were going, but also about the quality of the product were delivering.. Western Union International Bank GmbH is regulated by the Financial Markets Authority in Austria, [i] Agent location count valid as of 31 December 2017. These are more tactical, day-to-day ways to implement lean across the organization. Finance. Increasingly, digital technology and mobile devices play a key role in these transactions. Consumers can 'Send Now, Pay Later' by borrowing up to AUD 2000 through Beforepay's wage-advance product on Western Union's digital channels. And its not something you can achieve really quickly, its a multiple-year process. Here is Swamy Sivasubramaniyan, Head of Financial Services and Settlement Platform for Western Union, discussing the digital transformation experience with Infosys and Oracle. Services, Consumer When people send money to friends or family across the country or around the world, chances are good that Western Union is involved. few clicks, you can use OutSystems to bring your visions to life. Team members were drawn from different continents and operating on different time zones. The international roll-out continues to other countries at pace. Western Union. The Future of Payments is Invisible | CIO Harveer Singh Leads Western Union's Digital Transformation - Profile Definition of Digital Transformation - IT Glossary | Gartner The transition from legacy systems to Oracle Solutions was critical to the strategy's success. Korea, United - Earn My WU points. . These strategies are paying off. Us, Terms Since 2008, Huawei has offered a wide and expanding range of . They can include creating strategy placemats (one-page strategy overviews that are easily shared), frequent team huddles, one-on-one coaching, and process confirmation. In order to fund the investments, we decided that it was really important to do a transformation exercise, look for ways to gain efficiencies and effectiveness across our processes and procedures, and then use those efficiencies to fund the growth investments. Singh estimates that the project has reduced how much it spends on talking to its customers by a quarter, while markedly improving this critical function. Western Union is working alongside Amazon Web Services (AWS) and AWS Partners to transform and expand its business, including the launch of a new digital bank. People who knew how a team or a group worked before can come in and see its night-and-day different. Western Union Digital Banking is offered by Western Union International Bank GmbH. Deloitte announces multi-year collaboration with AWS to co-innovate and engineer solutions that help institutions expedite the launch of digital banking services and modernize their legacy core banking stacks. Receive rewards. Ericsson will help accelerate Econet's digital transformation journey. The pandemics economic stressors created a situation where more people suddenly needed to send money to family and friends around the world, many of whom rarely use financial services. Now data is the driver and applications are being developed to handle that data and represent it to business stakeholders to make it consumable. Western Union uses a central team to build new capabilities across the business. Thats really enabled a lot more collaboration across groups. Services, High Over the last two years, Singh has been accelerating Western Union's tech plan. We saw that our revenue and customer base didnt reflect the opportunity and size of the market.. Western Union launched its digital banking app in Germany and Romania in Spring 2022, following 11 months of iterative development. Updated on. Commenting on the advantages of development on OutSystems, Tom says, "We estimate that we're getting new products . Think of Western Union, and its yellow placard advertising an agent location comes to mind. 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). Join us to learn how your organization can become a leader in the Data Economy and the business benefits that result. Digital transformation & economic opportunities - Blog - Western Union Convera. There was a need to accelerate the process we wanted to undertake, I have that experience of transformation projects happening on a massive scale. For example, we began offering an option for telephone money transfer. 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. Rica, Hong Watch this tech inequality series featuring scholars, practitioners, & activists, Sign up for the Digital Initiative Newsletter. Now Departing: Union Pacific's 40-Year-Old Mainframe | CIO Meeting the moment with solutions required Western Union to accelerate its own digital transformation. You stepped in as CMO just as COVID-19 was emerging, and I cant imagine that a global health crisis was what youd envisioned for your first 100 days. Western Union's digital transformation - Think with Google of Use, Payment . The new generation of customers, especially Millennials, want to find us in the ecosystem of messaging apps.. Last year, the global-payment services giant completed 268 million consumer-to-consumer transactions worldwide, for a total of $80 billion. In Western and Central Africa, only 36% of the population has access to broadband connectivity. But new innovators are highlighting a problem for Western Union: multi-homing is high with money transfers. Companies like Venmo(PayPal) and Zelle(joint venture by several large U.S. banks) have deep pockets, but so far are mostly competing in domestic payment markets. It works with Talend to streamline data movement in compliance with GDPR across financial, reconciliation, auditing and trading partners. What does "digital transformation" mean to Western Union? As we get the pilots completed, the idea is to turn the WU Way team into more of a center of excellence. Part of this agility drive involved Western Union migrating its legacy on-prem IT infrastructure to the Cloud. Reliable for over 170 years. Society Updated: 01-06-2022 - 11:45. Singh also sees huge potential in the use of blockchain for specific use cases within financial services and payments, for example, helping with the Know Your Customer (KYC) process that is important to stopping money laundering and fraud and eliminating many of the checks that currently hold up cross-border payments. Salesforce has been such an important part of the digital experience journey.. Western Union is a global leader in cross-border, cross-currency money movement and payments. [4] Form 10-K for the year ended December 2017, p.7. So youre really talking about game-changing differences between how processes worked before and after. His career span includes working with organizations like FIS, Western Union, HCL Technologies, CGI, Mahindra Satyam and iGate Global Solutions. The company considers local preferences, as well, accepting about 10 payment methods, such as Apple Pay in the U.S. Funds can be picked up in cash at half a million Western Union agent locations worldwide or transferred electronically to the recipients bank account or to a debit card linked to a digital wallet. McKinsey's Kausik Rajgopal and Lang Davison recently sat down with Western Union's CEO to talk about its multicultural customer base (and . Profiles, Infosys Knowledge We also innovated to make our services more inclusive for customers by creating new ways to send funds digitally and offering real-time digital account payouts. We use OutSystems in multiple layers of our tech stack, says Tom. Western Union Customer Journey Transformation With a history of more than 170 years, the company has a presence in more than 200 countries and territories, connecting more than 120m people to one another and to the global economy, through cross-border money transfers in approximately 130 currencies. [12]Josh Constine, Western Union Brings Money Transfer and Its Tricky Fees to Chat Apps, TechCrunch.com, Feb. 4, 2016. Its been a great combination. Some want to go to a retail store and pay cash. Revenue from Western Union's digital money transfer services spiked from $600 million in 2019 to over $850 million in 2020. Western Union is a partner of the World Economic Forum (WEF) and is a leading voice in the conversation of how to build a global payments ecosystem, which is stable and where remittances can be made much faster.