Using Alibaba Cloud to quickly digitalize priority areas
AS it launched its campaign supporting the digital transformation journeys of finance companies in the Philippines at its “Fintech Summit 2022” Alibaba Cloud Intelligence’s Country Manager for the Philippines, Allen Guo, also said that it is ready to support the digitalization efforts of the country under the new administration of President-elect Ferdinand Marcos, Jr.
“Alibaba Cloud has many technologies available which can enable digitalization of public sector services, agriculture, health, and taxation. When the scenario is there we can respond to the needs through our many local partners,” Guo told the media at the press conference that preceded the virtual fintech meeting.
Alibaba Cloud, is the digital technology and intelligence backbone of Alibaba Group which has in its portfolio, many technology platforms, software, and implementations that can digitalize whole industries, and verticals, as well assist governments in running or creating smart cities.
Already it has helped create the City Brain project, a collaboration in Kuala Lumpur City that integrates and analyzes big and heterogeneous data generated by video and image recognition, data mining, and machine learning technology.
In 2017, Alibaba and the Special Administrative Region of Macau, partnered to start the transformation of the state into a smart city by using Alibaba Cloud computing technologies. At first, it focused only on tourism and immigration. It has since expanded to benefit residents of the country, including smart transportation, smart tourism, smart healthcare, and smart city governance, as well as talent development and deployment.
At the Fintech Summit, Alibaba launched its “Fintech ONE” program. It will offer participating fintech companies in the Philippines easy access to advanced cloud technologies, free technical training, and professional consultations. Each eligible company will receive up to $10,000 in Cloud coupons which can be redeemed against Alibaba Cloud products and services as well as support from Alibaba Group’s ecosystem.
Eligible companies will benefit from streamlined access to technology solutions from Alibaba Group’s ecosystem and its affiliated company Ant Group – including those that facilitate e-commerce and payment processes – to help participating companies maximize emerging opportunities in the Philippines. Alibaba Cloud will also assist fintech companies in engaging with local and global investors and accelerators to help grow their businesses.
In line with local government’s favorable policies to support the fintech industry, Alibaba Cloud’s “Fintech ONE” program aims to speed up the digital transformation of businesses via secure, reliable and scalable cloud solutions, while helping boost financial inclusion in the country.
“Through digitalization, consumers will enjoy financial products that are convenient, affordable and fit for purpose. It will also help financial institution broaden their client base and improve their operational efficiency,” Benjamin Diokno, Governor of the Banko Sentral ng Pilipinas, said during the summit.
“Alibaba Cloud is excited to witness what the future holds for the digital industry and particularly the fintech sector in the Philippines. We are already seeing transformation and strong expansion in these areas, and we aim to further stimulate this through initiatives like the Fintech One program,” Leo Liu, General Manager of the Philippines, Hong Kong, Macau SAR, Alibaba Cloud Intelligence said.
As the leading public cloud service provider in Asia Pacific, Alibaba Cloud offers its expertise in cloud technology to provide appropriate products, including elastic compute, database, security, storage and network services and machine learning and data analytics capabilities, to address issues and challenges in the sector. It works with various fintech players including GCash and UBX.
Alibaba Cloud provides a mix of fintech solutions to GCash to handle large volumes of digital transactions with minimal interruption and high-cost efficiency. For Mark Frogoso, GCash’s Chief Information Security Officer, its partnership with Alibaba Cloud showed its true value when the pandemic disrupted the global economy.
“We became a lifeline to many Filipinos and our active users and transactions increased tremendously as people sought new ways to transact. With Alibaba Cloud’s solutions, we have been able to keep pace with customer growth, while ensuring that we provide them with optimum service,” Frogoso said.
For UBX, Alibaba Cloud provides an Electronic Know-Your-Customer (eKYC) solution designed to help boost their efficiency and security through digitalising the identity verification process. “With Alibaba Cloud’s eKYC solution now in our open finance platform xpanse, developers can easily integrate cutting-edge technology towards their products and services through a single API integration,” said UBX’s President and CEO John Januszczak.
