SAB is one of the leading corporate and institutional international banks in Saudi Arabia and traces its origins in Saudi Arabia to more than 90 years. SAB is considered one of the most influential financial intermediaries in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf region, offering a wide range of services across trade finance, foreign exchange, equity and debt wholesale banking, digital service innovation, and ESG; in addition to integrated financial and banking services, including corporate banking, investment, private banking, and treasury.

SAB paid-up capital is SAR 20.5 billion, after the legal merger with Alawwal Bank on 14th March 2021, when it was legally known as the Saudi British Bank (SABB). SAB is a licensed financial institution operating under the supervision of and regulated by the Saudi Central Bank, and a partner of the HSBC Group.

SAB decided to maintain its profound legacy and ramp up its efforts to navigate through the future with its complex landscape of technology. The bank was opting for an easy-to-use tool that provides comprehensive and instant, yet credible, answers to its customers. The main perspective was offering a personalized experience of a fast-paced, around-the-clock communication tool. Furthermore, the bank management had a strategic perspective in mind, which is offloading, and cost-saving of the call center and marketing team while maintaining confidentiality considerations of its customers. Briefly, this tool should be able to satisfy the following requirements:

• Perform one-to-one conversations with customers and guide them through the bank’s services portfolio in a highly simplified comprehensible flow.
• Supports both English and colloquial Arabic.
• Operate on web platforms and mobile applications and through online banking, with an embedded capacity of introducing further channels.
• Provide geographical guidance in finding the nearest ATM or branch and sharing its location over the supported platforms.
• Provide menu-based experience and free text with an advanced auto-complete feature
• Recommend the most convenient bank product to customers based on their answers to a number of automatically generated questions, and furnishing necessary information about the product in subject.
• Being equipped with FAQs with a huge variety of small talks for non-banking talks (ex. greetings, general conversations..etc).
• Provide digital lead generation by capturing customer behavior and questions to be able to generate digital leads and provide specific promotions based on customer interest.

Oracle.. WIND-IS and Unparalleled Efficiency

A furious competition took place at this stage among different technology options that best realize SAB targets, satisfy its requirements, and evaluate leading-edge providers who can implement that solution in a modular timeframe. WIND-IS stood out among a huge queue of high-level competitors and was awarded the implementation project.  

WIND-IS was able to finalize the implementation phase in only six months. The solution provided used advanced artificial intelligence (Oracle Digital Assistant) to assist customers and gather key data. The first version was equipped with general inquiries and some products announcements. Later, SAB in collaboration with WIND-IS invested intensively in the implemented solution to fulfill its future vision.

The implemented solution is considered an important milestone in the digital transformation journey of SAB; it does not only deliver customer-centric solutions and innovative touch points, but it also serves as a highly efficient rebranding tool.

In 2019, SAB finalized a complex and lengthy merger process with ALAWAAL Bank. This process has certainly given rise to millions of questions and inquiries from the banks’ clients. The bank was determined to provide its clients with credible, timely, and clear answers. The Chatbot played a crucial role in conveying in-depth knowledge to the bank’s clients and sustaining its level of credibility.

Furthermore, supports users using two main approaches; the first is offering a clear, detailed, and comprehensive demonstration of banking products and services. This demonstration is coupled with the necessary steps to subscribe or request a given product/service. The second approach is the guided flow; it simply asks the user a few questions and employs the answers to recommend the most suitable product to the users based on these answers.