Ratnakar Bank announces capital infusion of Rs 3.28 bn

IRIS 10th April 2014

Ratnakar Bank (RBL), India's fastest growing scheduled commercial bank, today announced the completion of a Rs 3.28 billion capital infusion as part of its third round of financing in the last three years led by leading global investors like CDC Group Plc and Asia Capital and Advisors.

Existing investors, including International Finance Corporation and Gaja Capital also participated in this round. These new funds will assist the Bank in expanding its branch network in semi-urban and rural areas of India as well as providing a suite of financial products and services to the unbanked sections of society.

Founded in 1943, RBL Bank traditionally concentrated in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Goa. In 2010, a new management team was brought in to pursue an expansion strategy focusing on financial inclusion, agribusiness financing and lending to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), as well as increasing the Bank's geographic footprint. Today the Bank has a total business size of over Rs 210 billion and offers its services to over 500,000 customers.

Over the next five years, RBL Bank plans to increase its client base amongst financially excluded groups to 1.3m accounts supported by a robust ICT enabled strategy.

 The Banks investment in state-of-the-art systems and architecture has been one of the main drivers behind its scalability of operations, innovation, client service and expansion of various businesses.

''We are strongly aligned with RBL Bank,s strategy to expand and provide a range of financial services to customer segments that are under-served by the market, and our stable investment approach will complement the company's strong management team as they continue to implement the Bank's growth strategy,'' said Nagarajan, CDC regional director South Asia. ''We view this as a unique opportunity to invest in an institution which has a real prospect of becoming a platform serving a population that CDC wants to reach and fostering financial inclusion, financing of SMEs and agribusiness.''

Francis Andrew Rozario, chairman and CEO of Asia Capital and Advisors said, ''We have been impressed by the track record of the management and staff of RBL Bank which includes their successful transformation to their performance across all segments of the economy; from Commercial to micro enterprises and from Urban to Rural. We are delighted to support and be a part of their journey to making a meaningful impact on the lives of millions throughout India.'' 

''IFC's repeat investment will assist RBL Bank in expanding innovative financial services to under-served micro, small and medium enterprises, helping increase access to finance,'' said Serge Devieux, IFC director for South Asia. ''Through IFC's support, RBL Bank will be able to scale up its operations and build institutional capacity to grow its various businesses in a sustainable manner.''

Infosys Finacle Achieves New Global Benchmarks for Processing Banking Transactions;

 

Successfully Supports Over 1.9 Billion Customer Accounts on Oracle SuperCluster

Finacle can process six times the volume of transactions currently processed by the entire US banking system; achieves Oracle SuperCluster optimized status

Bangalore – April 9, 2014: Infosys today announced that its Finacle core banking solution(1) running on an Oracle SuperCluster engineered system(1) has set new global benchmarks for the number of transactions processed across key banking functions. In a test that was audited and reviewed by the global audit firm, Ernst & Young, the solution supported over 1.9 billion(2) bank accounts with near linear scalability – a number higher than the current population of China, the most populous country in the world(3). The tests were conducted across a mix of 12 business-critical online transactions and batch processes. The Finacle solution(1) was tested on an Oracle SuperCluster and Oracle SPARC T5 servers with Oracle Solaris 11 to determine its performance and scalability parameters.

The test also saw Finacle processing 726 million effective transactions in four hours, or over 50,000 average transactions per second, to manage workloads comprising of multiple online transactions and customer touch points as well as third-party systems. This represents six times the daily volume of transactions currently processed by the entire US banking system, based on industry estimates of transaction volumes(4). These results highlight Finacle’s capabilities to help banks manage extremely large transaction volumes and cater to a dynamically growing customer base at lower costs.

Key performance highlights(1)

• The Finacle core banking solution(1) processed interest accruals for over one billion term deposit accounts in less than 87 minutes, or an average of 213,000 records per second.
• The solution demonstrated its ability to manage large delivery channel workloads by processing 204 million effective transactions in 35 minutes, or an average of 97,000 effective transactions per second.
• Interest payments to over 79 million savings accounts were processed in 32 minutes, or an average of 41,000 transactions per second.
• The test was simulated on the Finacle database of over 49 terabytes having over 205,000 branches and more than a million branch users.
• Finacle’s latest performance levels(1) have shown an improvement of three to five times over its own earlierestablished benchmarks.

Additionally, Infosys Finacle(1) has earned the Oracle SuperCluster Optimized status through Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN), demonstrating that Finacle(1) has been tested and tuned on Oracle SuperCluster to deliver speed, scalability, and reliability to customers. Infosys is a Diamond level member of Oracle PartnerNetwork.

Quotes

Haragopal M., Senior Vice President and Global Head – Finacle, Infosys
“Efficient performance and robust scalability are critical requirements for banks to manage growth globally. The current lab benchmarks demonstrate Finacle’s prowess in consistently processing large volumes of transactions across critical banking functions. With Finacle, banks can now scale without worrying about managing exponential increases in business volumes and operational costs.”

Stephen Greer, Analyst – Retail and Business Banking, Celent
"Infosys Finacle is, unsurprisingly, at the top of their game right now. This benchmark further underlines Finacle’s impressive capabilities. The last time Celent recorded a scalability benchmark from core banking solution providers was in 2012 for the large bank core banking solutions assessment. The current lab benchmark numbers published by Infosys present significant results which are better than data published by some leading industry players, demonstrating that Finacle is one of the most scalable core banking solutions available. It's no surprise that Finacle was the leader for sales in Celent’s core banking sales ranking for 2013. This is definitely an accomplishment and something Celent will be watching going forward."

David Hicks, Vice President, Worldwide ISV, OEM and Java Business Development, Oracle
“Oracle Exastack Optimized recognizes partners who have optimized their solutions on a complete, integrated and cloud-ready infrastructure in order to help them accelerate innovation, unlock new features and functionality, and deliver superior value to users. By achieving Oracle SuperCluster Optimized status, Infosys has demonstrated that its Finacle core banking solution is tested and tuned to work with Oracle SuperCluster to help deliver performance, scalability, and reliability to their customers. With the latest benchmark figures achieved with Oracle SuperCluster, Finacle has demonstrated its ability to support near linear growth in transaction volume and customer base for retail banking.”

Notes:

(1) Infosys Ltd., conducted a performance benchmark exercise of Finacle Core Banking Solution version 10.2.13 (herein referred to as ‘Finacle’) on Oracle Solaris 11.1 operating system, Oracle T4/T5 servers at the web, JEE and application layers. Further, Oracle RAC database was deployed on Oracle SuperCluster, WebLogic Server 10.3.6 was deployed on JEE servers and Oracle Http Server 11.1.1.6 was deployed on Web servers for online transaction processing mix of 12 business critical transactions
(2) The benchmark was simulated on Finacle database of size 49.84TB having 205,028 branches, 947,364,904 customers, total of 1,969,026,822 accounts, 17,825,570,000 transaction history and 1,037,904 branch user.
(3) China’s population figure as of 2012 from World Bank website
(4)As per the recent CEB Towergroup report titled Planning Your Cross-Channel Future published on Dec 2012, the total volume of transactions per year in US is 73.9 billion or 205 million transactions per day

About Infosys Ltd

Infosys is a global leader in consulting, technology and outsourcing solutions. We enable clients, in more than 30 countries, to stay a step ahead of emerging business trends and outperform the competition. We help them transform and thrive in a changing world by co-creating breakthrough solutions that combine strategic insights and execution excellence. Visit www.infosys.com to see how Infosys (NYSE: INFY), with US$7.4B in annual revenues and 158,000+ employees, is Building Tomorrow's Enterprise® today.

About Oracle PartnerNetwork

Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) Specialized is the latest version of Oracle's partner program that provides partners with tools to better develop, sell and implement Oracle solutions. OPN Specialized offers resources to train and support specialized knowledge of Oracle products and solutions and has evolved to recognize Oracle's growing product portfolio, partner base and business opportunity. Key to the latest enhancements to OPN is the ability for partners to differentiate through Specializations. Specializations are achieved through competency development, business results, expertise and proven success. To find out more, visit http://www.oracle.com/partners

Trademarks

Oracle and Java are registered trademarks of Oracle and/or its affiliates.

Oracle SuperCluster Optimized is part of the Oracle Exastack Optimized program which allows partners, such as Infosys, to leverage OPN enablement resources and dedicated lab environments to help develop, test and tune their applications on Oracle Exadata Database Machine, Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud, Oracle Exalytics In-Memory Machine and Oracle SuperCluster engineered systems. Oracle SuperCluster engineered systems are Oracle's fastest and most scalable engineered systems and are ideal for DBaaS implementations, consolidating databases and applications, as well as private cloud deployments. With the world's fastest processors and Oracle Exadata Storage Servers optimized for Oracle Database, Oracle SuperCluster delivers unprecedented price/performance for mission-critical databases and applications. Oracle SuperCluster demonstrates Oracle’s unique ability to innovate and optimize at every layer of the stack to simplify data center operations, drive down costs, and accelerate business innovation.

Safe Harbor

Certain statements in this release concerning our future growth prospects are forward-looking statements, which involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from those in such forward-looking statements. The risks and uncertainties relating to these statements include, but are not limited to, risks and uncertainties regarding fluctuations in earnings, fluctuations in foreign exchange rates, our ability to manage growth, intense competition in IT services including those factors which may affect our cost advantage, wage increases in India, our ability to attract and retain highly skilled professionals, time and cost overruns on fixed-price, fixed-time frame contracts, client concentration, restrictions on immigration, industry segment concentration, our ability to manage our international operations, reduced demand for technology in our key focus areas, disruptions in telecommunication networks or system failures, our ability to successfully complete and integrate potential acquisitions, liability for damages on our service contracts, the success of the companies in which Infosys has made strategic investments, withdrawal or expiration of governmental fiscal incentives, political instability and regional conflicts, legal restrictions on raising capital or acquiring companies outside India, and unauthorized use of our intellectual property and general economic conditions affecting our industry. Additional risks that could affect our future operating results are more fully described in our United States Securities and Exchange Commission filings including our Annual Report on Form 20-F for the fiscal year ended March 31, 2013 and on Form 6-K for the quarter ended December 31, 2013.These filings are available at www.sec.gov. Infosys may, from time to time, make additional written and oral forward-looking statements, including statements contained in the company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission and our reports to shareholders. The company does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements that may be made from time to time by or on behalf of the company unless it is required by law.

The Management Tip of the Day :Three Questions to Ask a New Boss

April 10, 2014 When you start working with a new manager, asking how she likes to operate can help you build a productive relationship. Your boss may not think to articulate her management style, so asking thoughtful questions will demonstrate your attentiveness and interest in efficiency.  “Do you prefer that information be delivered formally or informally?” If she prefers the former, prepare documents in advance of meetings and send frequent updates on assigned projects. If the latter, don’t clog her inbox; update her at crucial junctures or when you need guidance. “How do you like to process information?” She may like to hear it and respond in person, or to see it in writing before a conversation. “How would you describe your management style?” If she likes to have a hand in day-to-day operations and decision-making, touch base often. If she’d rather delegate, keep her posted on major developments, but handle most details on your own. Adapted from Managing Up (20-Minute Manager Series).

World Bank projects 5.7% growth for India in 2014-15

PTI | Apr 9, 2014, 11.07PM IST

WASHINGTON: The World Bank on Wednesday projected an economic growth rate of 5.7 per cent in 2014-15 for India on the back of a more competitive exchange rate and many large investments going forward.

"Bolstered by permanently more competitive exchange rate and progress towards clearance of important investment projects, India may see an acceleration of growth (factor costs) in FY 2014 to 4.8 per cent, further increase to 5.7 per cent in FY 2015," the World Bank said in its latest edition of 'South Asia Economic Focus'.

Another multilateral agency IMF had on Tuesday forecast that Indian economy would recover from 4.4 per cent growth in 2013 to 5.4 per cent in 2014. The estimate triggered a rally on Indian bourses, with BSE benchmark sensex surging close to 360 points to all-time closing high of 22,702.34.


The Indian rupee, which plunged to all-time low of 68.85 in August last year, has since then recovered to trade in 60-levels against the US dollar. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) had also cited export competitiveness as a reason for possible growth recovery.

The World Bank report said in India the problem is the banking sector's growing exposure to company debt. The fear is that this could ultimately affect the government's finances through its ownership of state banks and the need to prop up distressed but systemically important banks, it added.

In its twice-a-year 'South Asia Economic Focus', the World Bank forecast that economic growth in the region would rise to 5.8 per cent in 2015 from 5.2 per cent this year and 4.8 percent last year.

South Asian countries — Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka — appeared to have largely recovered from last year's financial turmoil caused by changes in US Federal Reserve monetary policy.

Many were rebuilding currency reserves while curbing current account deficits, it said.

But these successes on the external side were accompanied by looming problems in the domestic economy. Economic growth could be held back by unstable banking sectors, inflation, fiscal deficits and debt, and persistent shortfalls in energy and transport infrastructure across the region, it said.

RBI steps in to end 'unfair' scrutiny of PSU bankers

Ethindi.com | Apr 9, 2014, 11.29AM IST

MUMBAI: The constant fear of being haunted by the Central Vigilance Commission (CVC) for taking an incorrect decision may be a thing of the past for the government-owned banks if the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has its way.

The CVC, an authority set up to weed out corruption among government-owned units, is the most feared organization among bankers since it can question business decisions taken by lenders anytime in future, unlike its peers in private banks.

For the first time, the banking regulator has begun a dialogue with the CVC to define terms like frauds and diversion of funds with an aim to put an end to numerous cases of officers paying a price for genuine business decisions going wrong and rivals using CVC as a tool to stall many a career .

If funds are diverted, but the business does not suffer, it's not a fraud. If funds are diverted by a rich company, isn't it a fraud? But if the business fails, then the authorities are quick to say there is an element of fraud," said a bank chief from a public sector bank who did not want to be named while questioning the modus operandi of the CVC.

Several senior officials from government-owned banks have refrained from taking lending decisions as they are demoralized after witnessing several of their colleagues being questioned of mala fide intention if the borrower fails to repay the money. "If a borrower fails to repay, why should the authorities question only the lenders and not hold the borrower equally accountable?" he asked.

Also, for lenders, the CVC is perceived as a very powerful organization since no general manager or executive director could be promoted to a higher level unless the CVC gives them a clean chit. To overcome this, the RBI proposes to establish a procedure and define what could be mala fide so that it can come under the purview of the vigilance authority.

"Every policy is greeted with suspicion and scrutinized for evidence of malfeasance. With no upside to making decisions, it's no wonder that decision-making has slowed. The solution, however, cannot come through inaction, but through action. Action that is, and is seen to be, purposeful, unbiased, and effective," RBI governor had said at the Bankers Conference in November.

"No doubt, mistakes will be made, but if the weight of clean actions builds up, the miasma of suspicion that pervades our society today will ebb. The RBI intends to play its part in making this happen," he said.

Trust Thursdays : Quotegems9:

Trust Thursdays : Quotegems 9:

You can never cross the ocean
unless you have the courage 
to lose the sight of the shore