The financial services and insurance (FSI) industry in the UAE has been in digitisation mode for some time. Traditionally, only the telecoms sector rivals FSI on digital transformation maturity and the success rates of programmes. An April 2022 report from KPMG shows that Middle East banks are currently using a range of digital technologies such as blockchain, AI, and machine learning. Use cases do not just cover customer-facing areas, but extend to regulatory compliance, corporate governance, and risk management.
The industry-player list has expanded too, to encompass the many fintech firms that have devised solutions to ongoing issues – some longstanding, some new; some widespread, some niche. Fintech’s are on the march. Mordor Intelligence cites the Covid pandemic as the basis for its projection of 12 per cent CAGR between 2021 and 2026 for the UAE fintech segment.
Meanwhile, the UAE Central Bank’s Instant Payment Platform (IPP) is scheduled for a launch in the fourth quarter