innovation cicc intesa also sanpaolo technological italian
POST EVENT- “The future of banking: technological trends reshaping theindustry”, October 16th, 2020Dear Members and Friends of the CCIC,The webinar “The future of banking: technological trends reshaping theindustry”, which has been organized by China-Italy Chamber of Commerce CICCand supported by the Consulate General of Italy in Canton, the ConsulateGeneral of Italy in Hong Kong, and the Italian Chamber of Commerce Hong Kong -Macao, took place via Zoom, on October 16th, 2020.The speakers who took part of the event were: * Paolo Bazzoni, CICC Chairman * Enrico Iaria, Vice Coordinator of the Innovation and Technology Working Group (I&TWG) of CICC * Vincenzo Antonetti, Head of Network Development of Innovation Communication, Culture and Marketing of Innovation of the Intesa Sanpaolo Innovation Center * Savino Damico, Head of Fintech Ecosystem Management and Monitoring, Innovation Department, Intesa Sanpaolo S.p.A.The webinar was moderated by Vittorio Oliva, Vice Coordinator of Innovationand Technology Working Group (I&TWG)of CICC and Head of Italian Coverage ofthe Hong Kong Hub Branch of Intesa Sanpaolo S.p.A.The event explored how the Innovation Functions of an International bankinggroup are interpreting their “roles”, in order to stay ahead of competitionand at the same time to support Customers also allowing the scaling ofprimarily Innovative and Technologically-driven start-ups and SMEs in HostCountries including China.For also CICC Chairman, Paolo Bazzoni, “Innovation is the key success factor”and companies and the banking industry, being business partners, have to worktogether, in order to come up with innovative and business-oriented solutions.He also stressed that the CICC can support in achieving these goals.In fact, the CICC has already established an Innovation and Technology Workinggroup (I&TWG) with the mission to enhance competitiveness of its Members andcollaboration between and among the enlarged Italian and Chinese “CorporateSystems”. In this regard, Enrico Iaria, Vice Coordinator of the I&TWG of CICC,in its welcome speech, highlighted the 3 pillars upon which the activities ofthe I&TWG are predicated being basically: i) the promotion of and subsequentadoption of “state -of-the-art” technological solutions; ii) on-and-off fieldsupport to Italian Institutions and Institutional-led technologicalinitiatives and projects in China and conversely to Chinese Institutions andInstitutional-led technological initiatives and projects in Italy; iii)Information via engaging learning contents and the adoption of digital /virtual platforms and means.”Moreover, the speakers focused on two main contexts where to apply innovation:digitalization and fintech.On the one hand, Vincenzo Antonetti stressed out the importance ofdigitalization and digital technologies in the banking sector. He took as anexample that the top 5 companies in the world are technologies giants and theyare present in different sectors related to the financial field as Tencent,Alibaba or Amazon, putting pression on banks. He explained how this impliesthat nowadays new players are conquering the global market, and innovationtogether with digitalization seem to be the right solution to remaincompetitive. He also stated that Intesa Sanpaolo still has a stronginternational footprint, because of its great value and customer basedstrategy, as well as the ability to establish links with other bankinginstitutions, also through outsourcing and circular economy.At last he mentioned China as one of the most attractive countries for IntesaSanpaolo for several reasons. In fact, according to Antonetti, the Greater BayArea can be considered the new Silicon Valley, Hong Kong is the best placewhere to start a technology business and Shenzhen is overtaking Israel as a“Start-Up” country.On the other hand, Savino Damico dealt with technology that will transform theway financial services will be delivered within the next years. He consideredfintech as a tool which provides best solutions for customers and to improvethe efficiency of internal processes. He specified that fintech can workdifferently in several business areas such as blockchain and ArtificialIntelligence, even considering the amount of money invested in suchtechnologies over the last years.According to Damico, partnerships and collaborations to assess and use theFintech Ecosystem at a global level are fundamental for building national andinternational ecosystem network: that permit to recognize in advancetechnologies and solutions, having a high quality rate and comparing andsharing information and project ideas. Also the European Central Bank and theEuropean Commission are proceeding in this direction, evolving theirRegulatory Framework in order to boost the digital market.Lastly, the speaker explained some practical uses of Artificial Intelligencein Intesa Sanpaolo, such as news scanning, Marketing Propensity Intelligence,Prospect Targeting and Self-Driving Finance.The event ended with questions, moderated by Vittorio Oliva, that primarilyfocused on Antonetti and Damico’s speeches about why China is attractive forItalian and International companies, and how Open Innovation and Open Bankingare defined and declined by and within Intesa Sanpaolo Group.Kind regards,CICC Team