AITEC BANKING & MOBILE MONEY COMESA 2010: Africa is pioneering region for banking innovation

Africa’s new position as a pioneering region in banking innovation is reflected in East Africa’s leading conferences for the financial services sector:

AITEC Banking & Mobile Money COMESA, Nairobi, 24-25 February

These leading-edge conferences are unique for the breadth and depth of knowledge to be provided by local and international experts, and for the high-quality exhibitions providing marketing opportunities at each.

The conference programmes include the following key topics, all vital for bankers to seek leading-edge knowledge in a fast-changing business environment:

• Mobile banking - New technology and regulatory frontiers and challenges for banks and mobile operators
• Compliance & risk management in the post-meltdown world
• Understanding the generation y customer: service excellence, cross-selling & market intelligence
• Are the region’s financial insititutions winning the war against card fraud?
• Interbank payment reforms – new transaction & settlement systems
• Solutions for investment banks & stock exchanges
• Microfinance innovation and new frontiers
• Regional banking: technology challenges in cross-border, multi-country operations
• The new financial services ecosystem – challenges of integration in cards, cheques & mobile
• Communication systems for banks
• New channels - branchless, agent & post-office banking
• Mobile banking implementation in the real world
• Outsourcing, shared infrastructure and hosted services models
• Core banking integration - incorporating new services and innovations: insurance, assurance, stocks & shares
• Disaster recovery & business continuity

The Hon. Uhuru Kenyatta, Kenya’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance will open the conference. Also speaking in the opening session will be Professor Njuguna Ndung’u, Governor of the Central Bank of Kenya.

The conference will play an important role in reinforcing Nairobi’s role as the region’s financial services centre, and the theme “Leadership through Innovation” reflects the country’s leadership position in mobile banking.  Announcing the conference, Sean Moroney, Chairman of AITEC, said the event is an important platform to showcase the exciting mobile payments innovations currently being implemented in Africa. “When we started this conference series four years ago, the emphasis was on East Africa learning from the rest of the world, now bankers, mobile operators and others wanting to learn about mobile banking will be coming to Nairobi to learn from innovators in the region.”

The conference has widespread industry support, with the Paynet Group as platinum sponsor, Sun Microsystems and Technology Associates as gold sponsors and S1 as silver sponsor. Supporting Organisations for the event include the Kenya Bankers Association and the Kenya ICT Board. CGAP is holding a workshop on management systems for microfinance institutions, linked to the conference. The Gates Foundation will hold a breakfast briefing for bank CXOs during the conference on providing banking services for the unbanked.