Power-packed sessions highlight Day 2 of BFSI Technology Conclave

The second day of the BFSI Technology Conclave organised on May 6-7, 2022 at Pune, witnessed a lot of hectic activities and proactive participation by the delegates. The day started with the much-awaited Fireside Chat with one of the most sought-after executives in the BFSI industry – Nitin Chugh, Deputy Managing Director and Head of Digital Operation at the State Bank of India. The session was moderated by Srikanth RP, Editor, Express Computer, and The Indian Express Group.

Chugh spoke candidly about his early days and how he spent time with researchers and academia. He shared his professional life experiences from his association with HCL and Modi Xerox. The delegates were attentively listening to the conversation as Chugh stressed the need to be open to new opportunities along with the right decision-making abilities. Delegates were keenly following Chugh’s recount of his life experiences, i.e., how the transition from branch banking and sales to the digital role in HDFC Bank. “The March of Mobile Money: The Future of Lifestyle Management Book by Mehul Desai and Sam Pitroda, was an eye-opener for me,” Chugh, commented while replying to a question from the audience. He underlined the need for regular skill enhancement for executives at all levels and said, “While one always looks for courses to enhance one’s skills, on-job learnings are far better than training and certifications.”

Technical presentations by experts were one of the major attractions at the BFSI Technology Conclave on Day 2 too. After the Fireside Chat, Gunjan Issar, Regional Manager BFSI, Data Protection Solutions at Dell Technologies made a presentation on ‘Proven and Modern Architecture for Data Protection for BFSI Industry.’ During his presentation, he stressed the need to protect the data to gain confidence in business operations. While Issar spoke on the necessity to build robust infrastructure, he underscored that one should focus on outcomes and not on infrastructure. According to Issar, transparent snapshots simplify VM image backup delivering near-zero impacts on VMs… Isolation, Immutability, and Intelligence are key to cyber recovery. “Dell Technologies has got the ability to make value additions in its offering across the verticals,” Issar added.

After a detailed discussion around data protection, the next subject on which two experts from Juniper Networks made the presentation was “Leveraging AI to Enhance Experience in New Age Banking.” Rajesh Kumar, Technology Head, Enterprise & Government, India and SAARC at Juniper Network introduced Apstra which is an intent-based networking software to automate and validate the design, deployment, and operations of data centre networks in multi vendor environments. Kumar claimed that the software automates network deployment and operations through validated and repeatable designs, manages workflows easily, ensures enhanced network security, and implements network changes faster with change control and validation. “Today, the security perimeter is everywhere, as the application moves across. Security should be connected end-to-end, and can’t be placed in silos anymore,” Kumar opined. He also mentioned that digital transformation is all about client-to-cloud with AI-driven solutions.

Right after Rajesh Kumar’s presentation, the first panel discussion of the day was hosted. The subject was ‘Enterprise Security: How to Proactively Protect Your Organisation in the Digital Era’. The session was moderated by Lalit Trivedi, Head IT, and CISO, ITI Mutual Fund, who said that a proactive approach is one of the most demanding elements in the BFSI sector today.

Among the panelists were Maya Nair, CISO, CRISIL; Pawan Chawla, CISO, Future Generali India Insurance Co Ltd; Ashutosh Jain, CISO, IndusInd Bank; Mitesh Tolia, CISO and VP, Jio Payment Bank; and Manoj Naik, CISO, SBI Life Insurance Co Ltd.

While Tolia highlighted the need to have defined drills for cyber and ransomware attacks, Nair said, “Understanding business needs is as crucial as understanding technical requirements to improve security environments.” Chawla agreed with the statement made by Nair and expressed that proactive protection is not just about technologies, but is also a matter of culture in various organisations. Naik, however, attracted everyone’s attention by identifying the threats in detail before looking for securities technologies. He also said that it was essential to learn from other organisations’ experiences.

Trivedi concluded by mentioning that risk calculation is one of the most crucial requirements in the BFSI sector.

Before the tea break, the session concluded with an interesting presentation by Ashwin Patil, Vice President, Enterprise Business at Skit.ai – an organisation that works with most brands including banks. “We service 40-plus customers across in their technology journey. We are solving rural and urban challenges through voice bots,” Patil said. Voice bots are much in demand nowadays in the industry as they play a crucial role in contact centres. “Skit.ai creates a customer service engine that leverages the combined power of human agents + our purpose-built voice AI technology,” he stated.

After the tea break, the delegates again assembled to listen to one of the most respected tech leaders in the BFSI industry – Shiv Kumar Bhasin, COO, and CTO at the National Stock Exchange of India. Bhasin underlined the need to take an integrated view of the entire ecosystem for restoring services, which includes connectivity, applications, networks, and databases. He also suggested using automation to efficiently determine the options to reduce the probability of errors. With technology advancements, today, NSE is able to effectively switch over all the critical systems much below the expected timeline.

As mentioned earlier, technology presentations continued to engage CXOs from the BFSI sector at the conference as experts namely Pratik Garg, Founder, and MD, & Ravi Shankar, VP, Client Success at Progressive Infotech Pvt Ltd (WORKELEVATE), and Deepak George, BFSI Business Head at Automation Anywhere made detailed presentations on “Service Transformation for Future of Work with ‘Workelevate’ and “Fuel Digital Transformation in Financial Service” respectively. As per Progressive Infotech, WORKELEVATE is a digital workplace service transformation solution (platform + services) built upon the organisation’s diverse end-user experience management expertise of over two decades.

According to George, quality of experience plays a significant role in digital transformation. He said, “When human and digital workers work side-by-side, amazing things happen.” Automation Anywhere is fuelling the transformation with digital co-workers, RPA on Cloud, Automation Process Insights and discovery, Bot Economy, etc.

Varun Sridhar, CEO of Paytm Money, delivered an interesting address on the Future of Technology in Wealth Management and Trading. Sridhar explained why engineering and data science is the most crucial department for the success of a company like Paytm Money. He also said that his organisation was working on developing solutions that would help its customers not lose money on trading.

The day ended with another power-packed session on “Understanding the Increasing Relevance and Preference for Emerging Technologies in the BFSI Sector”. Prasanna Lohar, VP, Innovation and Digital Architecture, DCB Bank; Dipak Nair, CTO, Tata AIG General Insurance; Prerak Mehta, CTO, Easy Home Finance Ltd; Vijay Vasudevan, CDO and Head – Digital Initiative, Tata Motors Finance; and Rishabh Garg, CTO, U-Ergo, Capital Limited were the esteemed panelists for the session. It was moderated by K V Dipu, Head of Operation & Customer Service, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance.

K V Dipu sought the opinion of the panelists on the subjects and tried to understand how various banks and institutions are making the most of technologies in the domain. “AI, big data and blockchain technologies have transformed the banking experience. Many banks are looking to adopt Metaverse and invisible interfaces in times to come,” said Lohar. Dipak Nair supported the statement and agreed with the fact that video streaming, AI, drones, and newer technologies are becoming normal technologies even in general insurance. While commenting on the use of technologies in recent years, Vijay Vasudevan acknowledged that Tata Motors Finance has also used a lot of technologies in recent two years. Mehta also mentioned that he believed the entire mortgage industry can also think of going digital in near future, while Garg advocated the use of public cloud and associated technologies for the betterment of the entire sector. Mindset for digital adoption can be a deal-breaker in the digital transformation journey, K V Dipu concluded.

Express Computer also announced the names of Award Winners after the last panel discussion for the day at the BFSI Technology Conclave.

Here is the list of Award Winners: