Sumaiya Siddique, MBR Team

Circle FinTech Ltd. is a fintech dedicated to work with financial inclusion. In order to achieve this, it works closely with Central Bank, Banks, NBFI, MFS, MFI, PSO, PSP. Circle Fintech’s vision is to create a unified financial economy.
MBR: Circle FinTech is the only open banking enabler in Bangladesh. Would you please share how the idea came up in your mind with us? What motivated you most at that time?

Circle FinTech: I sit on the Board of one of the Commercial Banks in Bangladesh which allows me to view the finance industry from a Birdseye view which is seldom possible for most FinTech here. The fact is that banks are the most audited entities to operate in the market and are subject to all the bells and whistles of Bangladesh Bank. We all say that banks have not done enough. In reality, they are the reason why the wheels of the economy go round. But, I also believe, they could do better. The problem lies with the lack of infrastructure. Banks simply have failed to deploy touchpoints throughout the country owing to high costs and overheads. Banks want to offer their products to the masses and are actively looking for ways to engage. The disparity is the problem and that is what prompted me to enact Circle.
In my opinion, this is where open banking can help tremendously. By the creation of a safe and highly scalable platform, it is possible to help the banks and other FIs to offer their products and services to the masses. On the other hand, my analysis brought me to the notion that we will be seeing a massive uptake of FinTech projects in Bangladesh following the success story of bKash.
This is when I started focusing on creating an ecosystem platform that would blend the concepts of open banking, essentially building 2 streams to connect everything. The first is Banking-as-a-service and the second is to build a modern payments rails that would pave the way for FinTechs, banks, and other FIs to roll out the next generation of digital finance products that is fully in line with the government’s vision of Digital Bangladesh. It would create a world of collaboration between FinTech and the financial industry that would propel Banking 4.0 and usher Bangladesh on par with the first world countries in the world.

MBR: As we are heading towards the Industrial Revolution 4.0 how do people benefit from financial services in the coming days from Circle Fintech?
Circle FinTech: No matter what business anyone is in, everything boils down to trade and commerce fueled by finance. Although Circle is in the open banking and payment rails business, the capacity that this platform has is to enable commerce in a sectoragnostic manner. Imagine embedding financial products directly in the process of trade. For example, offering a supplier’s loan is being offered on the fly at the point of purchase. This alone gives power directly to the buyer without having to apply for a loan from the banks in a traditional format which at present takes at least a month to issue. Something like this is easily made possible with Circle’s platform. This is a sample of the immense capabilities that our platform can help enable. Payments can be made near-ubiquitous to enable real-time trade facilitation. All in all, Circle empowers business, industry, and the government at unprecedented levels. I would dare say that Circle FinTech would play a crucial part in the success story of Bangladesh’s road to the 4th Industrial Revolution.

MBR: Circle Fintech is trying to create one open platform for all banks and NBFIs and other FinTechs. Can you please share with us what strategies you followed initially to mitigate the constraints to developing Circle FinTech?
Circle FinTech: To rollout Circle’s vision, TRUST is perhaps the most important factor, and gaining it requires recourse and accountability which is also paramount to any financial services provider. No bank would jump on board with us simply because I have a very promising idea. The truth is you have to earn their trust. For financial players, if you go on and on about how technically sound your platform is, it will never convert into a value proposition with them. You have to do your homework, you have to know what that Bank/NBFI stands for or what the direction of the business is. A pre-conceived disposition is not enough, you have to analyze their business strategy, study their numbers and draw up a value proposition that aligns with their aspirations. This is perhaps 70% of my focus before I approach any Bank/NBFI.
We started building our tech platform and our first approach was to take away the pains that banks seem to face when they try to connect with a third party. With our first bank partner we had to do a tremendous amount of handholding and in many cases developed the middleware necessary for them to enable connections. A high degree of patience and a deep level of understanding of banking operations is the keystone to creating a success story for Circle. Constantly being on top of regulations and molding our model is always necessary for this ever-changing financial landscape.
We helped our first bank partner process over BDT 300 crores using our platform, fully digitally and they really benefited from it during the COVID-19 pandemic. To this day, we also helped deploy their eKYC based bank account opening service across all their touchpoints. A clear trust was attained and that led to us forming stronger alliances with them where they are much more confident to connect with other FinTech products and service providers as well. Our strategy was to perform on our mandates and then replicate it across new partners. Today we work with 4 more banks and several more whom we hope to sign agreements with within the coming months. We stayed true to our commitment and held on to our belief systems. We knew, it is a marathon game and not a sprint, we never entered the market to score a few quick wins and then quietly exit the market.

MBR: Circle Fintech is currently working with Jamuna Bank. Their JustPay services amazed all the users. Would you tell us what the plan of Circle FinTech is?
Circle FinTech: With Jamuna bank we have had an eye-opening learning experience, the level of collaboration and knowledge sharing that took place was truly no short of amazing. JustPay was a product that actually helped Jamuna realize that FinTech can solve their problems and help them stay relevant in modern generation banking. The next step with them is the creation of a truly modern digital financial services platform built on top of our open banking and Payment Rails capabilities. This will help the bank design fully digital financial products from the ground up and reach their customer base more dynamically than ever. One of the strongest areas that Jamuna bank thrives on is the treasury bond business and they are also a primary dealer. We are helping them build the next generation of bond products that will further strengthen their position as the apex players in this segment.
We want to enable more partners like Jamuna Bank and help them to serve the wider gamut.

MBR: In the era of digitalization, where everything is going on digitally, how circle FinTech is planning to unlock new opportunities?
Circle FinTech: Finance industry of Bangladesh has not unlocked even 2% of its potential. We only saw the impact of what a P2P transfer platform can do for the economy. Imagine what the country can achieve, if we can help overcome more hurdles, solve more problems. We want to help open up access to finance for all by working with strategic partners. We know, we cannot do everything on our own. Hence, we have an open policy to empower all. We want to be the catalyst that fuels the next wave of digital financial service providers and together build the financial market of Bangladesh which stands for integrity and growth.