The global pandemic is having an unprecedented influence on companies all over the world. Remote working, in example, has quickly become the ‘new normal’ for workforces worldwide, allowing many workers to carry out their everyday tasks – albeit from the comfort of their own homes.
Fintech cannot remain stagnant as organizations shift to remote working settings and rely more on digital services and current technologies.
Furthermore, the World Bank has officially designated remittances as an important service, indicating the need for quicker adoption of digital financial services that can make remittances cheaper and more convenient during these uncertain times.
Keeping services up to date and easily available
With this in mind, the financial services industry should continue to drive innovation to improve cross-border transactions, which are critical to keeping the global economy humming.
Fintech and banks, notorious for being late to the game, must acknowledge the relevance – and urgency – of updating their offers or risk falling behind at a time when their clients are most reliant on them.
Fortunately, cloud-based solutions can assist payments technology in keeping up with a remote workforce. The cloud, for example, relieves financial institutions of the burden of procuring and maintaining their own hardware, installing and operating software, and employing a specialized workforce for 24/7 monitoring — a key aspect in these socially remote times. Furthermore, cloud technology enables these enterprises to update their systems remotely and on a regular basis, reducing the physical barriers that companies presently encounter with on-premises administration and assuring speedier upgrades to new features.
RippleNet Cloud is one such technology that has been very useful in assisting organizations in navigating the “new normal” of working from home. RippleNet Cloud is a service that connects consumers to more than 300 financial institutions in Ripple’s worldwide blockchain payments network without the need for on-premises software or onerous internal processes to buy new hardware and databases.
Keeping a competitive advantage
Despite the apparent benefits of the cloud, many of the world’s largest banks continue to lag in its adoption, missing out on its benefits to their businesses and the economy. Some of their reluctance stems from concerns about transferring customer-sensitive data to the cloud, although well-managed cloud infrastructure is just as secure as on-premises technology.
The need to modernize with technologies such as cloud computing will boost the competitive edge of forward-thinking banks over their slower-moving competitors now more than ever. The more agile and innovative players who are already using banking-as-a-service tech platforms to revolutionize their cost-to-serve and cost-to-change are in an ideal position to easily and cheaply plug into emerging blockchain networks, AI engines, and other generation-defining fintech capabilities. Existing and legacy banks that continue to rely on’museum’ banking systems will be slow to capitalize on this significant innovation.
The COVID-19 epidemic has shown an already compelling use case for the cloud in our sector – and it will give a lifeline for assisting companies and economies to prosper and remain competitive in this new and tough work environment.
