Alibaba-backed MYbank, a Chinese online bank backed by Alibaba, is set to share its risk management & AI data with financial institutions In China.
The online private commercial bank, which focuses on SME financing, has launched Star Plan to open up its AI, computing and risk management capabilities. Through Star Plan, MYbank aims to enable 1,000 financial institutions to provide more cost-effective financing services to 30 million SMEs and farmers in China in the next three years.
Announcing the launch at the 2018 SME Financing Summit in Hangzhou, Eric Jing, chairman of MYbank, executive chairman and CEO of Ant Financial, said, “The widespread application of advanced technologies in the SME financing space has dramatically improved risk management and lowered costs. With these innovations, we can unlock new opportunities for financial institutions and enable them to sustainably serve the needs of SMEs and farmers.”
According to China’s State Administration for Market Regulation, as of July 2017, there were approximately 73 million SMEs in China.
With a focus on serving SMEs and farmers, MYbank was established in June 2015 as the first bank in China that offers its services entirely on the cloud, without any physical branch.
MYbank is one of the brands under Ant Financial Services Group, formerly Alipay. It leverages Ant Financial’s AI, computing and risk management technologies to improve customer service, increase efficiency, and reduce cost.
MYbank provides a business loan that takes less than three minutes to apply for on one’s mobile phone, less than one second to approve, and which requires zero human intervention. Using proprietary AI and risk management technologies, the non-performing loan (NPL) ratio for MYbank’s SME business loans has been maintained at around 1%.
The traditional brick-and-mortar banking model is inefficient, with high costs and complex risk management processes. We always wanted to provide inclusive financial services for SMEs and farmers, but due to technology constraints, we were only able to service a few large-scale clients in rural China,” said Neng Wang, chairman of Guilin Bank.
“Ant Financial’s digital banking technologies helped us overcome the cost, efficiency, and risk barriers of SME financing, enabling us to service more clients in the rural market. Now, with Ant’s leading risk management capabilities, we are satisfied with the performance of our rural loan portfolio,” Wang added.
Earlier this year, Ant Financial, the payments affiliate of China’s Alibaba Group, has raised $14bn in its Series C funding round.
The financing round includes an RMB tranche raised by Ant Financial from domestic investors and a USD tranche raised by Ant. Singapore’s GIC and Temasek, as well as Malaysia’s Khazanah Nasional all participated in the latest round. Warburg Pincus, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Silver Lake, General Atlantic, The Carlyle Group, Janchor Partners, Discovery Capital Management and Primavera Capital also took part.
Copyright © 2018 RegTech Analyst
Copyright © 2018 RegTech Analyst
