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Vivek Iyer

Functional Consultant, Lending Industry Advisory Group, Banking, Financial Services, and Insurance, TCS

Rajesh Ramar

Consulting Partner and Lead, Lending Industry Advisory Group, Banking, Financial Services, and Insurance, TCS

Building ecosystems to serve small and medium business customers

Over the last few years, small and medium businesses (SMBs) have increasingly turned to alternative financial service providers for quick solutions. Coupled with increased focus on retail and large customers, this has diminished traditional financial institutions’ role in SMB banking. However, the economic crisis caused by the pandemic offers banks an opportunity to restore their supremacy in the SMB banking segment. While digital transformation in financial services is ongoing across different business lines, banks have failed to design SMB-specific digital offerings.

To remedy this situation, banks must adopt ecosystem models and build new digital capabilities through ecosystem partners. Assembling a variety of services on a single digital platform to meet the end-to-end needs of the SMB segment can strengthen relationships and increase market share. To implement a digital ecosystem integration platform and co-develop offerings, banks must:

  • Curate a network of ecosystem partners

  • Run pilots to test market acceptance

  • Ensure seamless integration with customer systems