Latest opinions that Bo Harald has shared on Finextra

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Bo Harald

Chairman/Founding member, board member

Trust Infra for Real Time Economy Prgrm & MyData,

Member since

04 Nov 2008

Location

Helsinki Region

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Bo's opinions

Back from the boiler room

In the old days the CIO was often a board member - as important as business area executives. Then came the age of internal procurement processes and the IT-departments were sent to the boiler room and told to show up only when asked to. Business will tell them what will be done and IT could decide how it should be done - but do it fast and much ch...

18 October 2009 /retail

Avoid ice ages..

Corporate inertia, quarterly capitalism and techno-hype have together created a rather sad overall picture of how digital services have been introduced. Far too often in the past digital services have been seen as - at best - side shows and top management support for promotion - badly needed in conservative organisations - have at best been lukewar...

14 October 2009 /payments Innovation in Financial Services

Do not complicate

It is very easy to make things difficult but very difficult to make things easy. As a result we see that many service are not the least user-friendly - not in design - not in language - too complicated - a no-brainer. The business environment is also getting fiendishly complicated as technology offers so many new alternatives with so many new h

12 October 2009 /payments /retail

Cash for crime

Computer Sweden writes - inspired by frequent high profile robberies - that cash is an invitation to crime. Legislators, banks and retailers are to blame for having failed to eliminate cash usage - despite cards having been around for 30 years on a large scale. Not only are piles of cash inviting robbers - it is also the enabler of drug trade, pro...

10 October 2009 /payments

Internet users are addicted..

When arguing for e-banking as the main service channel it is also important to take note that like in Finland age groups up to 45 are all there http://boharald.blogspot.com/2009/10/internet-users-by-age-group-in-finland.html and that all age groups are "addicted" (figures from Finland)- just waiting for more from the their banks also: ...

10 October 2009 /retail

Old folks in America showing the way

It may still be necessary to stress the need to develop e-banking as the main channel - from first, through second to third generation services (described here in previous posts). Counterarguments may still include "my parents will never...". Then it is useful to look at pictures like this:

10 October 2009 /retail Innovation in Financial Services

Next steps - on e-invoicing platform - in one picture

Could this be the order? 1. see the big picture - exciting to say the least 2. get the fundament in place - fast before the market is hopelessly fragmented 3. bold steps to migrate (deadlines for unstructured invoicing, transparent pricing) - can we afford anything else? 4. then start building on the mass market platform - legislators surely needed...

04 October 2009 /payments Innovation in Financial Services

e-banking in the old days...

In the old days - especially in the 80s before Internet - e-banking was seen as a supplementary channel - in addition to branches and contact centres. Today it is the main channel for almost all services - both for the customer in his private role and in employee roles of so called corporate customers. All banks have not yet adjusted their strateg...

30 September 2009 /payments Innovation in Financial Services

Real action by Stoiber

If you can lower the treshold to e-invoicing - as suggested below (emphasis mine) - you can automate accounting, public sector reporting, further the single market and much more. Then EU and member states have a chance to reach the 25% goal by 2012. If not - no chance. Who will take the responsibility for such fundamental failure? Stoiber and Verh...

22 September 2009 /payments Innovation in Financial Services

Widening Adoption Gap

Technology is not the narrow sector - it is amply on offer - and the costs are going from low to lower. Technology enables "anything" and in most cases the utility is evident. The adoption gap is still widening - even too much. Why is this happening? In some cases it may be the less than perfect first versions that have scared adopters of...

20 September 2009 /payments Innovation in Financial Services

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