Middle East, Africa, South Asia financial technology market to grow by 15%

The value of the Middle East, Africa and South Asia region’s financial technology market has been estimated at USD 6 bln in 2007 with expectations of an annual growth of 15% due to the increased spending of leading regional firms on core banking system and IT infrastructure upgrades.

Leveraging the tremendous opportunities within the region, Raqmiyat, a leading UAE-based systems integrator, has announced its participation at MEFTEC 2008, the region’s premier financial technology event, which is being held at the Bahrain International Exhibition Centre on February 11-12.

Focusing on its ‘Unified Front End’ solutions for financial institutions, Raqmiyat expects to attract the attention of top IT officials through this pioneering system, which facilitates user’s access to multiple systems within the bank using a single unified front-end application. The leading systems integrator is also set to bring the spotlight to its wide array of technologies from well-established partner vendors such as SOA Vision for Item Processors from Unisys, Cheque Truncation Systems from Aperta and the complete suite of Treasury and FX-related products from Wallstreet Systems. In addition, Raqmiyat has identified the tremendous opportunity to gain further brand awareness for the private banking and wealth management solutions and services from Odyssey Financial Technologies at the event.

“With the growing demand for compliance to international and local standards among banking and financial firms across the region, the financial technology market in the Middle East and neighbouring regions has been witnessing substantial growth through the years,” said Tapas Roy, COO, Raqmiyat.

According to IDC, the market for outsourced IT services in the UAE is projected to reach USD 170.5 mln (AED 626 mln) in 2010 from USD 81.27 mln (AED 298 mln) recorded in 2006.

“The increase in outsourced IT services is an inevitable development considering the rapid growth of businesses in the UAE and across the region. With companies wanting to stay ahead of the competition, one of the most efficient ways to achieve a leading position is to focus on developing quality internal resources while outsourcing non-core resources to a highly capable partner. At a time when efficiency in support services is a critical factor towards ensuring smooth operations, we believe that an organisation must be able to allocate its resources in the most efficient manner,” concluded Roy.