Recent Rollouts / Closeup: Renaissance Capital Calls on ASA to Keep Watch on Data

Renaissance Capital (Moscow; $989 million in total assets), an independent investment bank, recently expanded with the launch of a consumer finance unit, which began offering lending products in March 2004. With expectations for strong growth in loan application volume amidst a volatile Russian economy, the bank turned to Pittsburgh-based analytics provider ASA for a solution to manage risk and fraud.

ASA examined Renaissance's application review process and previous fraud activity, and reviewed the bank's data in order to recommend the optimum structure for predictive modeling. Using the bank's historical data and the ASA ScorXPRESS predictive modeling fraud solution, ASA created a fraud predictive model for Renaissance that integrates with the bank's Capstone Decision Manager application from Fair Isaac (Minneapolis).

"We researched many application fraud solutions and chose ASA because of their proven history of providing highly effective fraud models that would easily integrate to our Capstone system," said Fernando Silva, director of risk, Renaissance Capital, in a statement.

The ASA fraud solution went live in September and is in full operational deployment at Renaissance. According to ASA, the models will be updated periodically to reflect changing conditions in the Russian market.

Recent Rollouts

Standard Charter Goes Mobile

In October, Standard Charter Bank (Kuala Lumpur) went live with a mobile banking system in its consumer banking division in Singapore. SmartBank, by Helsinki-based mobile customer services provider Meridea, enables customers to access their online accounts using their mobile handsets. Standard Charter patrons can check their balances, prepare account transfers and browse transaction details -- even when their mobile devices are offline, according to the vendor. The bank plans to roll out the service to other countries gradually.

BankWest Deploys Token Devices

BankWest (Perth, Australia) is issuing Bedford, Mass.-based RSA Security's SecurID two-factor authentication tokens to its online business banking customers. The portable tokens generate and display a unique one-time password every 60 seconds. Customers will use the password along with their regular PINs to access online business banking services. BankWest began issuing the devices in September and intends to have all its commercial clients using the tokens by year-end.

Turkish Bank Revamps Core

In October, Turkish Bank U.K. (London) completed the installation of Geneva-based Temenos' T24 modular core banking system in all of its U.K. branches. T24 is designed to help banks better control the quality and application of customer data, and increase the accuracy and timeliness of reporting, according to Temenos. Turkish Bank U.K. previously used a range of proprietary systems developed by its parent, Istanbul-based Turkish Bank Group.