HALF OF FINANCIAL SERVICES ORGANISATIONS SAY THEY’LL NEED ‘INTELLIGENT DATA AUTOMATION’ TO SURVIVE

Financial services organisations see intelligent data automation as the future, helping to cut costs, reduce risk and improve compliance in one fell swoop

30th June 2021, London UK — Almost half (49%) of financial services organisations say that they will need to embrace ‘intelligent data automation’ to survive in what is becoming an increasingly competitive, regulated and cost-controlled industry, a new report from Duco finds today.

Intelligent data automation — a data management strategy that uses no-code, cloud-based technology to automate and control all financial, operational and commercial data across an organisation — helps firms to cut costs significantly while reducing risk and improving compliance with tightening regulation.

It works by removing the need for costly and time-consuming manual processes and manual error checking, while improving the data integrity and quality for the business overall — which reduces risk, enhances control and improves regulatory compliance levels.

The move towards intelligent data automation is driven by internal and external pressures, according to the report. Internally, 42% are struggling with poor data quality and data integrity within their organisation, while 44% say the amount and complexity of data they now have to handle as a business is unmanageable with their current systems and processes. Externally, nearly half (46%) want to get ahead of the competition and reduce the risk of regulatory fines from non-compliance.

Organisations, however, have made some progress with regards to automation. 92% are already benefitting from some machine learning-based automation in data reconciliation to a degree, but only 13% are using machine learning for all their data.

However, two in five (40%) say that Covid-19 has increased their interest in machine learning for data automation and more than a third (37%) say they would have suffered less as a business if they used intelligent data automation at the start of the pandemic. As a result, 42% say they will investigate the use of more machine learning in 2021 for the purposes of intelligent data automation.

Christian Nentwich, CEO, Duco said: “Over the past few years, financial services organisations have put up with manual processes for data reconciliation, only using automation for specific data types or purposes.

“The pandemic, however, has provided the impetus for real change now, and it also coincides with the point where intelligent data automation has become commercially viable. For the business, it addresses three issues in one go — cutting costs, reducing risk and improving compliance — and for the users of data, it helps them manage their data without the help of an IT team.

“That combination of benefits to the business and the end user is a game-changer for financial services data automation and control.”