AFS confirms its collaboration with Brankas to create direct bank integrations to allow for credit scoring, payroll disbursements, account-to-account payments and new bank account openings.
Arab Financial Services (AFS), a digital payment solutions fintech headquartered in Bahrain, has appointed Brankas to provide contemporary open finance infrastructure in the region.
As a result, AFS’ latest partnership will see the Singapore-based fintech extending its embedded finance solutions and open finance practices to the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region as a means to increase financial inclusion in countries including Bahrain, the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt.
The APIs that will be made available through AFS’ platform are critical in allowing tech platforms to offer essential financial services such as payroll disbursement, account-to-account payments, account services and credit scoring.
Samer Soliman, chief executive officer, Arab Financial Services
Describing how the partnership with Brankas will add value to the fintech’s fifty-plus regional banking network, AFS’ CEO, Samer Soliman, sees the integration with the banks’ infrastructure as “a natural step in our expansion and innovation.”
“Our vision is to empower our clients to deliver relevant and customer-centric products that positively impact the lives of customers,” continues Soliman, “and we are proud to partner with a well-established open finance vendor like Brankas to help us achieve our goal.”
Moving into MENA
In 2020, the Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB) began to introduce the Bahrain open banking framework (OBF) as a way to facilitate the implementation of open banking services across the kingdom and the wider MENA region.
Above all, the OBF includes detailed operational guidelines, security standards and guidelines, customer experience guidelines, technical open API specifications and the overall governance framework needed to protect customer data.
For Brankas, this move represents its entry into new MENA markets as it sets its sights on establishing a global open finance network following its 2022 partnerships with the likes of Visa, CRIF and McKenzie.
Todd Schweitzer, CEO and co-founder, Brankas
“Financial inclusion forms the foundation of everything we do at Brankas,” comments Todd Schweitzer, CEO and co-founder of Brankas. “We are incredibly excited about the opportunity to work with AFS to hone our open finance expertise in a new market with its own regulatory bodies.”
“Bahrain is leading the charge in the region to drive the holistic adoption of open finance, and we look forward to working with the visionaries here to improve the availability and quality of financial services for the everyday person,” concludes Schweitzer.
Founded in 2016, Brankas the series B fintech integrated with the likes of Bank OCBC NISP, BDO and BCA, and works with over 90 customers to provide embedded finance solutions that altogether help increase financial inclusion globally.
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