Transfers can be delivered in cash or into a digital wallet or a bank account via electronic funds transfer. Having got the right people in place, Singh and his team set about building a partner network to supercharge Western Unions technology evolution. Our research identified 10 attributes of an organizations data infrastructure that enable it to take full advantage of the data economy, the global supply and, Editors note: This is part of a series about the data economy. Digital transformation in the EUBenefitting people, the economy and the environment. Meridian, Infosys For more than 170 years Western Union has been helping people send money all over the world. Discover how Santander Consumer Finance replaced 70% of their core IT systems in three years with OutSystems. 2023 Snowflake Inc. All Rights Reserved | If youd rather not receive future emails from Snowflake, unsubscribe here or customize your communication preferences, Snowflake for Advertising, Media, & Entertainment, unsubscribe here or customize your communication preferences. That created a need to act. Its important to understand that business stakeholders are customers of our data. A lot of our big data environment is still on-prem and the mission is to move that completely to the cloud by the end of the year. (2013) Comparing Media Systems beyond the Western World. 35, No. I also agree with you that the competitive advantage of Western Union is a broad network of retail footprint across the world. What we are talking about is not cryptocurrency, it is not something that has to be mined. Jaffin: Evolution meant expanding the ways in which customers experience the brand digitally. Western Union has had a compound annual growth rate above 25 percent over the past five years, since the launch of the digital division. Western Union has innovated before. But for all its success, Western Union is undoubtedly a legacy player in a market that has been truly disrupted in recent years, with smaller and more agile outfits making waves in the increasingly digitised payments space. Security, Infosys At its core is a migration from on-prem to a cloud-based infrastructure, which it believes is key to allowing the organisation to scale and evolve into a company with the clout of an established financial institution combined with the agility and flexibility of a modern FinTech. And, Fellahi points out, When you look at customer acquisition on our digital channel, 80 percent of the customers we acquired in the past 12 months are new to usnot migrated from our traditional customer base., He expects digital money transfer and mobile technology to be the major driver of overall growth in coming years, adding, In the U.S., over 65 percent of WU.com transactions are initiated on a mobile device, and globally it is nearly 60 percent.. If any of these should fit what you're looking for, consider exploring a career with Western Union. [7]While cryptocurrencies are an obvious threat to Western Unions cross-border money transfers, Blockchain also can be used in a range of imaginative ways. However, Western Union would be wise to form a new, separate unit for exploring blockchain services. Services, High Western Union must adapt to an increasingly mobile world: if Western Union doesnt develop low-cost mobile money transfers, Western Union wont be able to compete with new competitors like Ant Financial and Zelle. Western Union operates in the increasingly competitive, rapidly changing payments sector, where new fintech players are changing how the market operates. Sector, Travel and Sub-Saharan Africa 3G and 4G mobile broadband coverage stands at 86% and 57% of the population, respectively. Its more about having the manager understand how the work actually gets done on the floor. Faced with numerous applications to deliver, the need to rapidly iterate customer experiences, and the steep learning curve for new Cloud DevOps toolchains, Western Union decided to evaluate low-code platforms. As a company, Western Union is in the middle of a transformational moment. Its an ecosystem of complementary platforms that enable a seamless, single customer experience I think thats such a powerful proposition.. The company considers local preferences, as well, accepting about 10 payment methods, such as Apple Pay in the U.S. Markets are perpetually shifting and change is unavoidable, but to keep up with those shifting tides companies need to stay focused on digital transformation. We embrace the white canvas and first principles design, breaking away from legacy systems to create smart . Second, we increased our use of digital media to reach customers and build a feedback loop. [1] One hundred years later, Western Union launched the first domestic commercial geostationary satellite (Westar 1). Unless they can feasibly use technology to improve their cost structure, Im super bearish on Western Union. Data safety. An advantage of Western Unions omnichannel approach is that it includes all customers, whether they are integrated or not in the financial system: the banked, the underbanked, and the unbanked. Blockchain is technology that uses an open, distributed ledger to permanently verify and record transactions between two parties. The paper analyzes the issues of digital transformation in the European Union in such key dimensions as financing digitalization and implementing public policy to bridge the digital divide in the EU member countries. Sources for images:Western Union vs. Bitcoin, Bitland,MyWU,Ripple Union. That makes it much easier to go into other areas of the organization and say, We did this in this part of the company. Western Union's cross-functional tech teams pushed out expanded digital options and real-time visibility on the status of its retail locations worldwide. Many of its 150 million customers worldwide depend on money transfers to pay for food, electricity, medication, and other necessities. Some changes that used to take a month, we now deliver in around 48 hours.. Microservices, Digital Process Its in our DNA to think about global operations because Western Union covers the world.. Reframe blockchain from a threat to an opportunity, by creating a new autonomous unit. This aims to support the transition of the region into a digital economy and bring the benefits of digital transformation, such as faster economic growth, more jobs, and better services. Packaged Goods, Engineering We set up virtual war rooms, met with our executive team daily to strategize, and spoke to customers every week to keep a pulse on their needs. Wingspan, Infosys From the earliest days of the pandemic, innovating the companys services to meet new patterns of consumer demand was an urgent matter. Procurement & Construction, Financial Its not done from the perspective of correction or a negative consequence. Singh was given autonomy to mould his teams, combining the skills already at Western Union with external talent, many of which were from a consulting background, resulting in a diverse and varied team, which he says proved invaluable. Most popular: Free $20 Amazon.com e-gift code for every friend you refer (earn up to $500). The Western Union Foundation is actively supporting NGOs that help refugees and migrants around the globe through education and financial literacy. Chief Data and Innovation Officer, Western Union, Enterprise-grade scalability and security, Cloud-based IT architecture based on microservices. Does it offer a more seamless customer experience? Having to maintain two sets of procedures on-prem and cloud for 18 months to ensure business continuity is chief among them, while teams have had to escalate a company-wide transformation during a pandemic. The Baupost Group is a $31 billion Boston-based investment firm. Rica, Hong Becoming digital first meant we needed to deliver fast, frictionless experiences, especially on mobile. The digital transformation is helping Western Union emerge from a challenging two-year era. Western Union's digital services align with the UAE government's policy to create an economy driven by innovation and technology," said Salma Massoud, head of digital, Middle East and Africa . Digital transformation in Western Union must be driven from the top-down. We will expand our Messenger bot to other countries and add other languages, he adds. As weve done that, everyone has started to speak the same language, whether its talking about going to huddles, doing process confirmations, conducting one-on-one coaching, or maybe doing floor walks. Looking back at the results of our work over the last couple of years across all of our deployments, you see some really impressive gains. Western Union is trying to use Blockchain as an incremental or modular innovation, when in fact it could be an architectural orradical innovation (see chart below) introducing entirely new businesses that fit well into Western Unions existing capabilities. The top challenge for businesses with digital transformation goals in 2023 is determining where their companies should direct spending on technologies, according to a BCG X report. Our goal was to build a new Cloud-based IT architecture based on microservicesthat would allow us to integratemany different systems quicklyboth internal and external vendors, explains Tom. Commenting on the advantages of development on OutSystems, Tom says, "We estimate that we're getting new products . That means we can onboard new developers and have them productive much faster, and weve got fewer knowledge silos in the development team., Moreover, low-code development on OutSystems helps Tom fight back in the war for digital talent. He also praises Snowflakes adaptability when it came to dealing with huge capacity increases. This will enable the company to maintain its high . Us, Terms Western Union's digital transformation efforts may fail to drive earnings growth, but they may be enough to keep earnings steady going forward. A large proportion of Western Unions infrastructure has been migrated to the cloud, and Singh reveals a timeline to complete the programme of work. Snowflake enables us to centralize our data and enable application and business processes to leverage it across the organization. And the new business model may require a very different RPP (traditional money transfer process vs. transfer via blockchain). Safety starts with understanding how developers collect and share your data. While WU is considered a global leader in their space, competitive insights and . Think of Western Union, and its yellow placard advertising an agent location comes to mind. He shares his views on digital transformation and economic opportunities for all. Introducing the next-generation operating model, Winning with your talent-management strategy. The second aspect is our agile work, where we spin up teams that have learned and are now experts in using agile methodologies for product launches or IT development. InsurTech & Crypto projects as the world embraces CX, Business Transformation and Digital . s full anLearn more about the data lake, a repository for structured, unstructured, and semi-structured data that provided direct access to raw organizational data. Poland followed later in 2022, while plans are at hand to launch Italy by the end of the year. Policy . Western Unions platform provides seamless cross-border flows and its leading global financial network bridges more than 200 countries and territories and over 130 currencies and 500K partner networks. We offer consumers the choices they want, both for sending and receiving money, he stresses. Digital transformation starts with people, which is a useful reminder that . . An undisputed leader in the global payments space, Western Union is driving a company-wide technology transformation, underpinned by migrating its infrastructure from on-prem to the cloud. Youre now a year into your role as CMO and leading through a prolonged global crisis. Reliable for over 170 years. Automation reduces development toil, were more productive, so we dont need so many developers, and we dont end up with orphaned code when developers leave. [2] Westar 1, Wikipedia, accessed April 2018. Deloitte announces multi-year collaboration with AWS to co-innovate and engineer solutions that help institutions expedite the launch of digital banking services and modernize their legacy core banking stacks. Singh estimates that the project has reduced how much it spends on talking to its customers by a quarter, while markedly improving this critical function. One of our most important tools is the floor walk. Manufacturing, Information Services Second, Western Unions employees may not have the knowledge or training to effectively lead Western Unions digital transformation, and may resist digital initiatives or operational changes. Others see blockchain as an opportunity to help emerging governments become efficient and transparent, for example, by serving as the official land title registration. Prior to implementing Snowflake in 2021, Western Unions data spanned 34 on-premises data warehouses, resulting in latency and operational burdens. NICE have announced Western Union, a global leader in cross-border, cross-currency money movement, has advanced customer experience through improved . 8 (Managing the Strategy Development Process). The transformation of a legacy company whose roots lie in the era of the telegraph involves more than just lean deployments and agile methodologies. Watch this tech inequality series featuring scholars, practitioners, & activists, Sign up for the Digital Initiative Newsletter. For example, De Beers is trying to create a diamond blockchain for registration and authentication, to prevent the spread of conflict diamonds. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press Cloud services such as cloud data platforms have become cost-efficient, high performance calling cards for any business that leverages big data. It requires a change in process and culture, the adoption of a common lingo, executive buy-in, and a center . Western Union offers digital transactions in 70 countries to move money around the world. This does have privacy implications and hence needs to be vetted out with regulatory authorities around the world. . Western Union is one of the largest digital money firms, uniquely positioned to connect the cash and digital worlds across platforms, devices, borders, and currencies. Snowflake: What do you see changing now that your organization is better able to share data? In 1861 it sent the first transcontinental telegraph. It requires a change in process and culture, the adoption of a common lingo, executive buy-in, and a center of excellence to ensure enterprise-wide success. We wanted plug-and-play convenience to integrate any technology.. Its one of the most widely used platforms from a data perspective and were expanding our relationship with Talend to start using some of its data quality products as well. After exceeding expectations in 2020 despite the outbreak of COVID-19, the world's largest currency exchange service Western Union looks set to exceed US$1 billion in total annual revenues for its digital business segment in 2021 a major milestone for the company and a first in the world of digital cross-border payments.. Western Union's shift toward digital shows little sign of relenting. Salesforce has been such an important part of the digital experience journey.. Log in to help. Western Union International Bank is licensed by the Austrian Financial Market Authority. The fusion of the digital and the physical, the irrepressible rise of new technologies. The culture change has to be driven across teams to show how technology has enabled different and better outcomes. The author approaches the problem using public. But new innovators are highlighting a problem for Western Union: multi-homing is high with money transfers. . Provide value consistently every month and deliver new value and capabilities. de 2007 - actualidad16 aos 3 meses. We serve all customer segments: from digital natives who are never without their smartphones to the 4 billion people on earth the World Bank estimates arent online yet., Western Union is strongly committed to migrants and to refugees: migration is at the heart of our business. Western Union is working alongside Amazon Web Services (AWS) and AWS Partners to transform and expand its business, including the launch of a new digital bank. Looking ahead, the Sales Cloud will be connected to the Marketing Cloud, which in turn is connected to our Care Cloud, so that whenever something happens across any of those products we are able to react in a way that suits that customer. So we had to figure out how to continue to show up for customers while also ensuring everyones health and safely. W ith the outbreak of a crippling global pandemic and a pronounced global economic slowdown, the last few years have been rather tumultuous for the world. When people send money to friends or family across the country or around the world, chances are good that Western Union is involved. Everest Group Low-Code Application Development Platforms PEAK Matrix 2022. Product Director, United States Money Transfer. Institute, Infosys Innovation [10]Jeff John Roberts, Western Union is Testing Ripple and XRP for Money Transfers, Fortune, Feb. 14, 2018. For decades, Western Union has defended its global position by investing in regulatory compliance. Cole heads the 169-year-old company's digital transformation efforts, including the design and development of the software powering those consumer-facing platforms. [5]. Denver, Colorado. Marketing tactics evolved to attract digital customers, who have a different profile from traditional retail customers.