A top FNB bank director has told the Future Bank Africa 2013 conference their innovation is different from the Apple model of going into a “a dark room, eat a lot of pizza and do cocaine”.
Paul Steenkamp, head of FNB innovators and employment branding, was the first major speaker at the conference, part of Africa’s Payments, Banking and Retail Show, in Sandton this morning.
Explaining the way the ‘World’s Most Innovative Bank’ innovates, he said: “We don’t do the Apple thing when we go into a dark room, eat a lot of pizza and do cocaine and then come out and say here’s a new device.”
Steenkamp described FNB as a fleet of speed boats, in comparison to its competitors which are “characterised by big battleships”.
He added: “If you are in charge of one of our speed boats, you are in charge of running it as if its your own business.
“Each of the captains of these speed boats chases profitability. There is a direct link between entrepreneurship and innovation.”
Prior to Steenkamp’s speech, Malcolm Macdonald, chief information officer of I-Net Bridge and chair of Future Bank Africa 2013, kicked off the Future Bank Africa 2013 conference by highlighting a number of digital landmarks from the past three years.
Amazon first sold more e-books than paper books in December 2009, the last typewriter was manufactured in 2011 and in March 2012 Britannica announced they would stop publishing the Encyclopedia.
Macdonald said: “These are not banking examples, but it shows we need to innovate from a paper business to an electric one.”
