Lenders leaping forward, with Paul Weiss

"If my mom asks me what I do, I say I work for a company that helps financial institutions worldwide to make lending simple". Paul Weiss is talking about Simbuka in that quote, a young and passionate software development company, focusing on financial institutions that operate in developing and emerging markets. And since the name Simbuka originates from the Kinyarwanda language, what better location to find Paul than in Kigali.

Simbuka is online at https://www.simbuka.com/ or find and follow them on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/simbuka/ )

Paul is on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/paul-weiss123/

You can seek me out on LinkedIn, too, where I'm open to all genuine new connections - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange - and follow the show's page while you're there.

Please seek me out on LinkedIn, too, where I'm open to all genuine new connections - https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendanlegrange - please also follow the show's page while you're there.

Meanwhile, my action-adventure novels are on Amazon, some versions even for free, and my work with ConfirmU and our gamified psychometric scores is discussed at https://confirmu.com/ and on episode 24 of this show https://www.howtolendmoneytostrangers.show/episodes/episode-24

And finally, I'm also co-creating a new podcast called hAIghtened senses which will look at the intersection between human senses and technology, especially AI-powered technology. You can already start to follow it wherever you're listening to this one - there's only a trailer there at the moment, but we've recorded some of the early episodes and it's going to be a fun ride!

Keep well, Brendan

The full written transcript, with timestamps, is below:

Paul Weiss 0:00

If my mom asks me what I do, I say I work for a company that helps financial institutions worldwide to make lending simple.

Traditional financial institutions are sitting on a pot of gold, they have a lot of data. In essence, they already so much about a customer.

Brendan Le Grange 0:21

Welcome to How to Lend Money to Strangers with Brendan le Grange. After the excitement of our first visit, we're back in Rwanda today, looking at purposeful systems, and the burning questions facing the boards of East African lenders.

Paul Weiss, head of growth at Simbuka - software solutions for banks - welcome to the show.

Unknown Speaker 0:56

Thank you. It's a pleasure. Thank you for having me,

Brendan Le Grange 0:58

Paul, you have a focus on East Africa these days, but your career roots are IndoDutch. So I don't usually do this, but if you don't mind, can we explore your master's thesis? And your first foray into international social entrepreneurship, I guess?

Paul Weiss 1:15

Definitely. Indeed, I did my master's thesis in Indonesia. And the topic of my master's thesis was entrepreneurial intentions of university students in the Netherlands and also in Indonesia, comparing the characteristics of students in Indonesia or in the Netherlands to make the decision to become an entrepreneur, yes or no.

Brendan Le Grange 1:37

I call that one out, because actually, sort of by chance, my MBA thesis was in a similar field. Not exactly the same, but I also looked at entrepreneurial intention within unemployed populations in South Africa. And it's something you don't think much about, but as soon as you start looking there, all these contextual aspects that can change whether or not programs succeed, and well intended efforts to drive things like entrepreneurship will work.

You then move to Accenture, and I guess that was your foray into financial services?

Paul Weiss 2:11

Absolutely. I did my Master's in strategic management, which is quite a broad business course, I would say. And it was a logical step to join Accenture and I joined their strategy and consulting department in the financial services sector, working there with leading banks.

From the beginning, I was focused on technology, how can you make sense of technology to do things cheaper, faster, more flexible, more transparent. So in those six years, I was based out of Amsterdam, was a huge learning curve for me and got me really deep down into banking as such.

Brendan Le Grange 2:47

Yeah. So Paul, obviously Indonesia and the Netherlands have historic links, so those earlier international efforts make sense but then from Accenture, about three years ago now, you moved to Kigali to join Simbuka, so two questions jumped to mind, who is Simbuka? And how did that move come to be?

Paul Weiss 3:09

Yes, Simbuka is, is a software company based out of the Netherlands started about 15 years ago, essentially, to help financial institutions to make lending simple.

And we do that by providing software solutions in the likes of a loan management system. And our management systems create a comprehensive system that streamlines all activities, from loan origination to disbursement workflow, credit scoring, document management, collateral management, all the things are packed into a software solution that we have.

Now, why did I make the choice to go to Kigali or to East Africa? One, the sister of my grandma lived in South Africa and in Zimbabwe, and my grandparents were there to visit them. And they came back with all these beautiful stories. And that sparked my imagination to the fullest, I would say. So in the past years, I went there on the holidays, and I decided to make that move, and to go there. And I really wanted to do something where I could bring my expertise and my experience, and having worked with the biggest banks in Europe, some of them even in America, gave me a good foundation to join Simbuka and to make lending simple, also for the people here in East Africa.

Brendan Le Grange 4:28

Yeah. And while I was reading the websites, cheating a bit, I saw that Simbuka is a Rwandan word. But it wasn't long ago that when we talked East Africa, we were talking about Nairobi as as the hub, everybody was in Nairobi. I mean, there still is a lot of exciting stuff happening ther, but as we said earlier, you're based in Kigali. What is the reason behind Rwanda and what are the benefits you're seeing working in that Rwandan scene?

Paul Weiss 4:54

East Africa is indeed more than Nairobi, I would say. I actually spent my first two and a half here in Uganda, in Kampala, where we did some projects. But I was overseeing the whole region flying from country to country to see how our clients are doing and what we could do more for for any other potential clients. A half year ago, I switched my base to Kigali.

And, of course, probably your listeners are familiar with Rwanda, with Kigali. And if not, it's, of course, very front running country in many aspects. And if you talk about loan software and doing things in a different way, because that's essentially what we are pitching to the financial institutions, Rwanda is a big country for us to show what we can do then then to leverage that experience to other countries like Uganda, like Malawi, like Burundi, Kenya, and Tanzania.

So Rwanda is for us a very safe haven, I would say, to bring our solutions.

Brendan Le Grange 5:52

You've been there three years now, in the region, to say in all the different countries talking to a range of lenders and some exciting fintech. So, when we first started talking, the thing that caught my eye, was that you had just published this fantastic article on the three burning topics in the boardrooms of East African banks.

So before we talk about sort of the nuts and bolts of what some bucur is doing, would you mind sharing those learnings out of what you've picked up in your time in East Africa? And what the sort of leading problems are or leading topics are that banks in the region are thinking about and getting to grips with?

Paul Weiss 6:31

Yes, definitely. First of all, I think there's there's a lot on the plate for banking executives. To be quite fair, everyone wants to have the Super App. Everyone wants to have digital transformations that run smoothly. First of all, it's not easy. But if I would distill from the last three years, what is what is really happening, I would come down to three topics. The first is credit scoring, in the region, gathering data is quite a young thing.

Gathering the right data is still something that is is emerging in that sense, but getting the scorecards, right is very important. Traditional financial institutions are sitting on a pot of gold, they have a lot of data, in essence, they know already so much about a customer. And you could see where you can actually evaluate the risk of your customers. You could even give them proactive products, practice services, etc, etc.

Getting that credit score cards, model right is an important one, also for the faster processing of your loans. And that is still relatively new topic in the region.

Second one is the everlasting debates of doing things in house or outsourcing or partnering. What do you develop yourself? And who do you bring into your house basically, and I would sometimes call it to become truly streamlined and digital. And you should have a roadmap there for what do I do? And what do I deliberately not do. And that's still something that's still a bit fuzzy.

Sometimes when I stopped to the banking executives, and technology, in essence, is an enabler, not an objective. Then lastly, is straight through processing. Start with the basics. We all see these fancy terms about AI and optical character recognition and whatnot, all over the internet and all over LinkedIn, but just start with the basics, get your loan from A to Z in two days, and really drill down in what is happening in that whole chain. And how can we eliminate the waste?

Doesn't necessarily need to be technology can also be other things, but really go to the basics of processing, and see how you can improve that. Can we do maybe instant loan products? Can we transfer some of the manual processed products into instant loan products? Because we know the risk? We know what to do we know what to ask. By the way, we already have the information and you can get the engine running.

So those would be my three topics for now. But probably if you ask me next year, I'll have three other topics.

Brendan Le Grange 9:22

Yeah, I'm sure, because also, obviously, the customer expectations are changing so fast. You know, the days are gone when people would expect and be comfortable with these long delays and lots of forms to fill out. We're seeing innovation in the telco space in the E commerce space, people will start to well, people are demanding that from their lenders as well. So lenders now do need to look at how they're going to solve these problems, how they're going to be able to provide loans quickly with the sort of protection of a scorecard behind them.

And in that context, how is Simbuka helping? What do you bring to the market in East Africa when it comes to making these loans easier to do?

Paul Weiss 10:00

So, Simbuka is providing a flexible and scalable software solution. I think those those elements are really important. So what we bring to the market is a solution that can be. And I would say that we also want the financial institution to own itself, we made the solution in such a way that you can set up your loan products, right now, it's quite intuitive to do so and quite user friendly - you can set your current score, you can set your workflow, you set your loan size tiers, and in one day, you have your loan products ready, you can even assign it to a particular branch, where you say, Okay, in this region, I want to have this product in this region, I want to have that product.

And in that sense, it's flexible, but also scalable.

If you look at some of our customers that we have, we do about 40,000 loans per day that are processed with our solution. Some of our customers still ask for on premise, but cloud based is also still very possible. And of course, we are able to integrate with all sorts of API's. So I think flexible and scalable differentiators in the market. I sometimes tell them, you don't need to call me, you can do it yourself. We made the solution in such a way that you are owning the solution yourself.

Brendan Le Grange 10:48

Yeah, and I'm on the page now, and it's a full end to end loan system. I mean, you're talking customer management, KYC loan origination that uses scorecard engines, but through to collections and recoveries, a complete loan solution. And I think that is a big difference to what used to be in the market where you could get a full loan management system from a big international provider, that would be very expensive and not really fit for purpose in an East African context.

Or you had an in house built system that solved one problem. And there was very little in between bad you've thought of everything. And as you say, even beyond that you connecting into API's. So other other existing solutions and whatnot can be incorporated. I imagine these are beyond the days of having to phone, your provider to code you a new column, if you've got a new type of data involved. This is fully designed for a world of big data and changing data.

Paul Weiss 12:22

Absolutely. It definitely addresses all of that. And maybe also, on top of that we're not only doing software. So when we are doing this, we're not automating what is there now, we automate it for the future. So when we enter a financial institution, we look at what is there now, but automating what is there now doesn't really have an added benefit, we would say.

So we would see, okay, you have your credit score set now. But learning from experience, what if you do this, you could reach the point be looking at workflow management you have now what if we can do things better, we basically fundamentally changing the way of working from top to down and that is also part of the service that we are delivering?

Brendan Le Grange 13:08

It's actually a great point to mention, because you're right, that one, there's a lot of leapfrogging that's possible. So we don't need to follow the steady path because new technologies have arrived. And you can go straight into much more flexible systems. So it's great to have somebody who understands where you come from, but also state of the art, like why can we leapfrog?

And, I guess, very related to that, but it's great to have someone who understands that sort of change, because it does take an organizational shift, to implement some of these things to move for the first time from manual to decision making moving away from committees overseen by committees, to we're going to program this into the machine. Are we going to reap the benefits of that? So it's a big change management moment to go from manual to digital, but then also not leave it there, as you say not to just say, Okay, we've replaced your three levels of risk committees with a scorecard. Hurray, we've saved some time and some money. But actually, what what should we be doing next?

And I mean, I guess we've seen a lot of that in the mobile money space in the region, where really global leading innovations are possible. When we say, hey, we don't need street addresses and landlines and the things that both the US and the UK systems. I was looking as I said, on the website. Earlier, I saw a number of really impressive logos listed there among your clients and one caught my eye NMB who we spoke to just a week or two ago on this show. But are there any customer success stories you can talk about that really showcase the sort of change that some bouquet is able to bring, whether it's software and whether it's working in building for the next level as well?

Paul Weiss 14:53

Absolutely, absolutely: NMB is indeed one of our most prominent customers, I would say.

So we started working with them 13 years ago. And I think we've been on the journey together from the start. And the beginning, there was a lot of manual, manual work, no credit scoring. And through those years, we were able to help them to significantly reduce in turnaround times to do about 200,000 loan scorings per month with zero to 1% non performing loan ratio, we are integrating with various third party data sources.

And we are also actively helping them with new products. And new products that we are seeing that gets a lot of traction is instant lending. Instant lending will change the industry the next coming years. And we've seen the increase with FinTech players, they'll come players to come to the to the front.

But in my opinion, the traditional financial institutions hold the key here, they're sitting on on a big pile of data, and they have all the characteristics to make this work with automated scorecards with I would say low touch, but high tech, that is a solution that we're bringing into the market that can deliver this for any type of financial institution. Think of payday loans, think of auto loans, overdrafts, even unsecured personal loans can be instant. And those are all loan products that we would like to support our customers with, to grow and grow.

Because that's indeed the name, is called Simbuka, a Kinyarwanda name that means "jump ahead". So we want to jump together, to make the jump together and to grow. And I think NMB is the perfect example of that. Where they were when we joined them and where they are now.

Brendan Le Grange 16:36

I had a little pocket of East African episodes, but purely by chance where we looked at Uganda, we looked at Tanzania, we looked at Rwanda. The upside is obviously we've got quite a lot of interest in that region at the moment, I've got some Kenyan episodes coming as well. If anybody is listening and saying, you know, they could really do with a jump in the lending businesses as well.

How do they find you online?

Paul Weiss 17:17

Yeah, so we're quite active on on LinkedIn, on YouTube, and the website, you mentioned https://www.simbuka.com/ leave your message there and I will get in touch with you.

But basically, we're also into networking. So we are speaking with the C suite leaders every day to see what their challenges are. And to see if it fits. It's quite a big change the alarm management system. And it's not done overnight. So we also understand that it might take some time to make the decision. But also, you can do it more modular. Maybe start with that instant lending, or retail, or SME or corporate and see how it goes. We are, as I said, very flexible and very scalable. So I'm happy to share what opportunities are there and how we can help you too.

Yeah, to make lending simple, basically.

Brendan Le Grange 18:08

Yeah, I think you're right, that that modular aspect of it is a big help, because you can identify one product, maybe in particular product you're looking to launch one with isn't even a legacy system and build like that MC, is it working in real life for you, and expanded in the organization from there, as you said, to make a decision in a bank, there's lots of levels of risk to think about that. topics that are common across lenders in the region, I think that expands across the continent to pretty much the whole world.

But yeah, anyone who's listening, encouraged him to jump across the website or find you on LinkedIn. Paul, it's obviously a region that is doing a lot of a lot of championing a lot of changing. You're at the the front end of that, you know, when you look ahead, what are your plans on the horizon?

Is there anything coming up we should be aware about or any events, you're out there, people should look forward to meeting you out?

Paul Weiss 19:01

One of the solutions we are going to push into the market is instant lending. So we'll be proactively getting in touch with the financial institutions to share what we can do for them. If it's the other way around. I'm also very pleased to to get their contact.

But I think instant lending is really emerging, especially for those traditional financial institutions with the competition of fintechs of telcos basically, they're taking a big piece of the of the pie right now. And I think it's really time for the for the financial institutions to step up.

Brendan Le Grange 19:33

As you mentioned earlier, I mean, those traditional institutions, well, we often talk about the fintechs, you know, taking that that share away from the big banks. The big banks aren't helpless. They're sitting, as you said, with these gold mines of data they've got these customers to reach out to so yeah, it's a great time for them to think about how do they fight back?

How do they turn the data there they have into good products for their customers in a region that is just really exciting for me, I think, you know many of the listeners are from elsewhere. I do think it's a region worth watching, just to see how these sort of changes come to market. So Paul, thank you so much for making the time today to talk to me a little bit more about what's happening there and the work that some book is doing.

Paul Weiss 20:17

Thank you for having me, and I love your podcast. I'll keep listening. And thank you. Thank you for your time.

Brendan Le Grange 20:24

And thank you all for listening.

Please do look for and follow the show on your favourite podcast platform and share the updates widely on LinkedIn where lending nerds are found in our largest concentration. Plus, send me a connection request while you're there.

This show is written and recorded by myself Brendan le Grange in Brighton, England and edited by Fina Charleson of FC Productions.

Show music is by Iam_wake, and you can find show notes and written transcripts at www.HowtoLendMoneytoStrangers.show and I'll see you again next Thursday.