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The awareness of fintech has been on the rise, as more banks participate in technological changes, new unconventional companies and start-ups begin to offer fintech solutions to the public, and an increase in fintech exhibitions and fairs can be observed all around the world. Below is a figure obtained from Google Trends, which illustrates the trend of Google searches related to fintech the past 5 years. As Google is known to be one of the most frequently used search engine around the world, the trend depicted will accurately reflect the awareness in fintech.
With reference to Figure 1, a value of 0 indicates that there is insufficient information regarding searches for fintech and a value of 100 indicates the maximum peak popularity for fintech. Therefore, Figure 1 represents the growing attention of fintech since 2015. The ‘note’ in Figure 1 represents an improvement made on Google Trends to collect search results.
Fintech is most known for its disruptive and unconventional impacts it brings to the traditional banking industry. (World Economic Forum, 2017) In light of fintech, the perception of banking today has changed drastically as compared to the past. As opposed to traditional banking that was once the monopoly of the industry, banks these days are following the trend of moving towards digitalisation, in order to remain competitive. (Williams-Grut, 2015) (World Economic Forum, 2018)
Attention for fintech amongst the public, investors and governments grew rapidly since 2014. (Arner) The graph below indicates a flourishing expectation in the fintech investments. (Statista, 2015) From the year 2008 to the year 2020, the value of fintech investments all around the world is projected to grow to a USD$46 billion industry. A market analysis that was done by Deloitte also suggests the same growing trend. (Deloitte, 2015)
Numbers in Figure 2 represent the total value of fintech investments across all segments of fintech. In general, fintech is divided into 4 segments: payments, financing, asset management and others. (Gregor Dorfleitner, 2017) However, there are variations from publications to publications. An industry report conducted by Statista found that digital payments segment in fintech was the largest in 2017, with a global transaction value (TAV) of US$2753.70 billion. (Statista, 2018) Following digital payments was alternative lending, followed by personal finance and lastly alternative financing.
As part of the thesis, an expert survey was conducted. Professionals who are currently working in the fintech industry, in addition, expressed most positivity and expectations in the payment sector of the fintech industry. Moreover, results gathered from another survey participated by members of the public also indicated the most interest in payment/personal banking. Approximately 50% of all responses collected indicated “Yes” for payment/personal banking services. Due to this uprising expectations of the payments sector by experts in fintech, this thesis aims to focus on the payment sector in fintech and to predict trends as accurately as possible. The integration of fintech initiatives into payments has brought about new areas of studies, in terms of business models, types of services, customers as well as the security of data. (Salmony, 2014) Therefore, this thesis aims to address these areas, as well as to offer suggestions to counter threats faced by payments in the fintech industry.
This thesis will be based heavily on business to customers (B2C) fintech products and services. It will consist of an extensive literature review and empirical research on reliable sources of information. Data used in this thesis will be from both primary and secondary sources. Primary data is collected through two surveys. The survey was divided into two target groups- first for the mass market and second only for senior professionals in the fintech industry. The purpose of the first public survey is to understand the preferences and needs of the mass market. The second expert survey was done to understand the strategy of two highly successful fintech company and their future expectations from a professional’s perspective. The experts are current professionals from Murex and Allianz Technology. As for secondary data, it is obtained from credible sources, such as government websites and industrial analysis reports. As certain names and keywords vary from sources to sources, they will be classified accordingly, as accurately and closely as possible. The information used in this thesis is further explained under “Methodology”. Primary data collected and secondary data gathered will be compared with each other to verify their accuracy.
The first chapter of this thesis gives an introduction to the fintech industry. The second chapter will analyse the digital payment environment. This includes the SWOT, PESTEL analyses and advantages and disadvantages. In the third chapter, it will discuss the digital payment industry today. The fourth chapter will be related to primary data findings through surveys and a comparison with secondary data gathered. Future predictions will be covered in chapter five. In chapter six, challenges and suggestions will be discussed to help fintech companies to overcome challenges and remain competitive. Finally, a conclusion will be in chapter seven.
Over the decades, several reasons like globalization, pressure from large counterparts (SMEs suppliers and customers), outstanding performances and advantages of competitors have driven SMEs to adopt standardized and integrated Enterprise resources planning (ERP) systems. However, implementing an ERP system is a very complex and risky project mainly for SMEs which can lead to ERP implementation ineffectiveness. There are many causes of ERP ineffectiveness, but important one mainly for SMEs is a lacking connection to organizational behavior (including structure and culture) during the ERP implementation, which may lead to misfits between existing organization behavior (structure and culture) and ERP systems because of two separate characters. The integration and standardization nature of ERP systems may not be compatible with all aspects of existing organizational behavior, and it is likely that some aspects or dimensions in organizational behavior influence the ERP implementation success or failure. Based on the theory of organizational structure and culture and the prior literature, this study examines which traditional organizational structure indicators (centralization and formalization), and on the other hand, culture indicators (team orientation and change orientation) affect the implementation of an ERP system. The finding ensures that a high degree of centralization and formalization dimensions of organizational structure has a positive, significant influence on ERP implementation effectiveness. Likewise, there is a positive and significant relationship between team orientation and change orientation of organizational culture with ERP project success. By analysing two firms of Estonia and Germany, this study declares that SMEs have a moderate attention towards their ERP implementation projects which shows that it is not always a problem of ERP implementation failure and proves that SMEs should be focusing not only on technical aspects of ERP system but on organizational aspects particularly on structure and culture as well that may increase the success chance of ERP implementation.
Due to the recent political and economic events of the so called U.S.-China Trade War, the media broadcasted extensively about both parties placing tariffs on each other. This situation impacts heavily on global value chains and brings an increasing focus on GVCs in terms of an economic upgrading in China. A re-examination of the bilateral trade relationships of China and its value added on export products becomes an interesting topic which deserves to be analyzed. In order to understand how GVCs function in international trade and their impact on public and private sectors, an overview of GVCs is presented. Using one of the successful examples of GVCs, this paper focuses on China’s high-tech industry and aims to evaluate its role in GVCs. By reviewing the transformation and development of high-tech industry in China, this paper provides insights into the change of industrial structure and current challenges during the transitional phase. By analyzing statistical data from Input-Output Table for China’s most advanced sectors – computer, electronic and optical products – this paper found out that China’s role of GVCs has changed overtime. More precisely, there is a trend of moving towards knowledge- and service-intensive sectors.
Rapid changes and advancement in technology are characterized in today’s economy, which has especially changed the nature of customer service. Customers are expecting more convenience and faster service while companies cope with this demand by increasingly utilizing automation processes, such as chatbots or social bots. While chatbots and social bots have great potential to be utilized in customer service, there has been little research that describes the possible applications, customer expectations and key challenges in their implementation. This study aimed to narrow this research gap by conducting a case study at the Daimler AG in Germany. Six expert interviews were conducted at the Daimler AG and a customer survey with 46 respondents was executed to explore the applications of social bots and chatbots as well as key challenges in the implementation of chatbots. Potential applications of social bots and two utilization types of chatbots were identified. In addition, a total of 14 key challenges were explored. These challenges can be combated with 19 optimization proposals, which help ensure a successful implementation of chatbots in customer service. This thesis ends with four recommendations that can be used by future managers of bot projects. These are: Transfer information about bots to all involved parties, enhance the conversational aspect, optimize the content development and expand the bot’s abilities.
This paper explores the different techniques used by search engine optimizers to increase a website ́s ranking, thus visibility. The author focuses on modern methods from the areas of On-Page and Off-Page SEO. Findings, gathered through a literature review, conclude that SEO has become a more complex process, as search engines algorithm have advanced; transforming from a pure technical optimization to a more user-oriented optimization. Furthermore, the paper identifies several areas that a webmaster can use to collect data to monitor a website ́s performance. In addition, insights into what the data can have for a meaning, are given. The paper finales with a brief overview of various ways to monetize a website.
The use of social media for marketing purposes has already begun replacing virtually all traditional marketing practices in order to cater to a generation of digital natives and young festival goers – a trend that can be especially observed in the music industry today. For all that, not all marketers of music festivals are fully informed about the necessity of a well-developed and multifaceted social media strategy. The goal of this study was to explore the topic of strategic social media in music festival organizations and to derive a model upon which music festival organizations can establish and form their social media strategy more effectively. For this purpose, a literature review was conducted and a combined social media model for assessing social media strategies of music festival organizations was proposed. Six prevailing themes pertaining to social media strategy that were identified constitute the model: 1. Channel selection and evaluation, 2. Audience analysis, 3. Communication style, 4. Social media content, 5. Social monitoring and risk management, and 6. Roles and responsibilities. In the second part of this study, a qualitative research design employing interviews and a case study was used in order to explore strategic social media use in leading festivals in Serbia, Croatia and North Macedonia. The findings of this study reveal about the impact of specific social media platforms, the use of analytics tools for gathering audience insights, the two-way interactive communication with the fans, the efficiency of content resulting from co-creation, the role and importance of PR in social media, as well as the position of social media in the organization and the staffing approach for social media marketing.
Digital transformation and globalization have become so prominent in today's life, that companies have to innovate in order to stay on the markets continuously. Thousands of new digital solutions are developed and launched daily, making it hard for the big slow corporation to catch up. In order to gain a competitive advantage, many corporates opened up to external sources of innovation such as suppliers, consumers, and startups.
This research focuses on showing how corporates and startups can mutually benefit from collaboration and particularly in the DACH region of Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. To highlight the importance of the strategic partnership, the research also includes a short analysis of the main cultural differences between startups and corporates, an economic overview of the region and the characteristics of a collaboration between startups and corporates.
To investigate the topic, qualitative research based on published secondary data has been carried out.
The automotive industry is undergoing substantial structural changes. New forms of powertrains and players are emerging. Manufacturers, due to internal as well as external drivers, are building their cars on platforms. By making use of modular design approaches, they hope to satisfy customer needs best and stay competitive. When designing global platforms, local variations are to be avoided. The presented paper offers an approach to rank components of an electric vehicle according to their likeliness of a local design adaption. To verify the results of the value chain- based analysis, the variant indicator analysis, interviews were carried out. The analysis shows that the battery is most likely subject to design changes. Also, variant drivers in the value chain bear the highest potential for local redesigns.
With the constant changes in the workplace environment, Human Resources practitioners and organizations are facing work environment shifts never experienced before. The future workplace consists of four generations working simultaneously (Baby Boomers, Generation X, Millennials and Generation Z) and there is a significant increase in the presence of technology, that advances and increases its potential exponentially, causing conceptual changes on what work is and what will be required to optimally operate in such environment. Therefore, the topic of generational differences is in the center of companies and researches’ attention. The main purpose of this paper is to propose knowledge sharing practices that can optimize the inclusion process of the multigenerational workforce. To achieve this purpose, secondary empirical data on generational differences, especially focused on work attitudes, ethics, and values were used. In addition, an in-depth interview with a Human Resources practitioner was conducted. The outcome was the proposal of five knowledge sharing practices, that this paper believes to promote long-term optimal results in multigenerational inclusion.
Retail banking provides financial services for individuals and families, and one overlooked aspect has been on international students in Germany. This study aims to discover and rank what are important banking factors for international students at HFU. Building on existing work from other geographical areas, it asks: What are the key factors that international students at HFU consider when choosing a bank?
Based on reviews of past literature, an online survey was distributed to potential respondents via email and social media channels. Analysis of the responses demonstrated that the most important factor is in the following order: (Most important) Security -> Services -> Financial Factors -> Convenience -> Reputation (Least important).
On this basis, it is recommended that banks consider taking into account the top important determinants (such as availability of online banking, cyber security, reliability, financial stability and responsiveness) and the least important determinants (word of mouth recommendation, popularity of the bank, tangibles, bank branches and parking facilities) when tailoring their strategies.