CASE STUDY Harnessing the Power of Emerging Technology:

The Government of Sharjah embraces HSBC’s digital transaction banking solutions and Kyriba’s cloud-based Treasury Management System.

In recognition of implementing the solution, Sharjah Finance Department Head, Sean De Silva, was awarded a Best in Class Treasury Solution in the award, at the 2018 Adam Smith awards ceremony.

Together we thrive Background

The Government of Sharjah’s It became clear that SFD needed to relationship with HSBC in the United leverage technology to significantly Arab Emirates (UAE) goes back more automate operations and minimise than 40 years. As the third largest of the reliance on the various manual Emirates, Sharjah contributes more than processes that were in place to make 7% to the overall GDP of the country. payments and reconcile transactions in the General Ledger. In line with best Sharjah Finance Department (SFD) practice suggested by the World Bank, is the Government entity responsible SFD decided to implement a Single for most of the country's public sector Treasury Account (STA) to manage finances. SFD wanted to strengthen cash in the most optimal manner. the financial controls of the Government through the migration The project started with an exercise of payment and cash management to gather requirements, map the various activities from various departments manual processes being undertaken into a centralised treasury team. and collate an inventory of all of the bank accounts held by the various HSBC, in partnership with Kyriba, departments and other entities. has helped SFD to automate its HSBC stepped in to work with SFD processes by using digital transaction on a request for a proposal to choose products and a cloud-based treasury a vendor that would provide a management system. solution to meet its current and future requirements alongside HSBC’s digital Requirements banking products. After reviewing a number of Treasury Management SFD’s primary requirements were to System providers, SFD chose to work obtain visibility over its cash positions with Kyriba, a leading fintech company across 250+ accounts with 16 banks; which supplies cloud-based treasury enhance financial controls; optimise management tools. liquidity management and control financial risk. The ultimate aim: to become more efficient and reduce the net cost of borrowing. The solution

Given the complexity of the Justain Bateman, Regional Head to pull funds from accounts held offset the implementation costs”. requirements and the aim to achieve of Client Integration at HSBC Middle at its other banks to HSBC.” full automation, HSBC provided East Ltd commented that “The lack Future enhancements include full business process analysis as well of bilateral agreements between banks In collaboration with Kyriba, the direct integration with SFD’s ERP to complete as technical consulting to build a in the UAE necessitated an innovative debit and wire transfer file formats the automation of the reconciliation comprehensive, bespoke solution (XML ISO2022) were quickly developed process, enhancements to the liquidity in partnership with Kyriba. Extensive Our processing and integrated into SFD's payment structure, automated cash-flow collaboration with the project team module. Kyriba also developed a forecasting as well as the roll-out from SFD, HSBC and Kyriba resulted times are significantly unique process to automatically of the solution to other entities within in an innovative solution combining reduced and we generate payment and collection the public sector of the Emirate. many products and services utilising instructions based on previous cutting-edge technology. have made significant end-of-day balances from the MT940s Through harnessing the power of operational cost and cash-flow forecasts minimising emerging technology, SFD’s processes SFD has so far implemented reliance on overdraft facilities and are now simpler, better and faster. HSBC’s digital banking platforms: savings. manual intervention. HSBCnet for viewing its balances across banks and HSBC Connect, solution to enable SFD to concentrate SFD’s Cash Management Section a host-to-host platform that provides all of its funds from various banks Head, Sean De Silva commented that secure connectivity between the bank, into the STA at HSBC. In agreement “Around 70% of transactions are now Kyriba and SFD. This has enabled with the Central Bank of the UAE we processed electronically and we have In recognition of implementing the SFD to receive consolidated electronic devised a solution using the recently gained full visibility over our cash and solution, Sharjah Finance Department Cash statements (MT940) from all of their implemented UAE Direct Debit system. financial transactions. Our processing Management Section Head, Sean De Silva, banks and straight-through transaction times are significantly reduced and was awarded a Best in Class Treasury processing capability fully integrated "This now enables SFD to generate we have made significant operational Solution in the Middle East award, at the with the Kyriba platform. a same-day direct debit instruction cost savings, which have more than 2018 Adam Smith awards ceremony. © Copyright HSBC Bank Middle East Limited 2018. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. HSBC Bank Middle East Limited U.A.E Branch, P.O.Box 66, , U.A.E, regulated by the Central Bank of the U.A.E for the purposes of this promotion and lead regulated by the Dubai Financial Services Authority.