mobile-only bank of Uzbekistan; TBC Bank UzbekistanIt has raised $37 million in new funding to strengthen its dominant digital presence in the Central Asian nation by developing new AI and tech products and attracting tech-savvy customers.
The new investment by the bank's London-based parent TBC Group comes five months after that. It earned $38.5 million. In July, the parent company announced to its shareholders; He also led the latest round involving the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) and the World Bank's International Finance Corporation (IFC).
Uzbekistan has been an attractive market for digital businesses in recent years, with nearly 90% internet penetration and a young population— 60% of its total population is under 30 years old.According to UNICEF, However, a significant share of the country's banking assets remains with its state-owned banks. TBC Group sees this as a growth opportunity.
Launched in 2020, the bank under TBC Group Uzbekistan offers a mobile app through which customers can open bank accounts and access banking services, including cash loans and deposits.
The Uzbekistan group, which is 60% owned by London's TBC Group and 20% each by IFC and EBRD, has recently expanded its financial portfolio in the country to facilitate payments operations and shorten time-to-market for new ones. offers; Involved in strategic partnerships with Visa and Mastercard. In addition, It introduced Salom debit card and Osmon credit card and launched TBC Business, a digital banking service for small and medium-sized Uzbek enterprises.
In the past few months, TBC Uzbekistan has started building its proprietary AI solutions, including agents to handle payment reminder calls for loan customers. Those agents attended 42% of all alert calls in the third quarter, Hughes told TechCrunch.
Next year, TBC Uzbekistan plans to expand its AI advancements by bringing service and sales bots and a dialog-based mobile service that will allow customers to interact with its app using their voice using a text-based interface.
“We're going deeper into the financial life of retailers across Uzbekistan. So we're building from vertical to different products,” Oliver Hughes, head of international business at TBC Group, said in an exclusive interview.
Hughes told TechCrunch that the group is hiring AI experts who build Alice, the AI assistant for Russia's Yandex. These experts have built a separate LLM in finance based on Meta's Llama, which understands regional differences and local languages, including Uzbek, the executive said.
The Hughes team didn't disclose the exact amount of capital it's dedicated to its AI efforts, but he did say that “a portion of the money raised will go to AI projects, but most of it will be for construction and scaling.” its business and consumer goods.
One of them will bail.
TBC Uzbekistan currently offers insurance through a third-party provider, but it plans to become an in-country insurer next year. It also plans a buy-now-pay-later solution and an SME lending product. Similarly, Mobile Bank will enhance its Salom debit card with new benefits and offers to attract more customers.
Uzbekistan is not yet a competitive market for a banking business. However, the country's growing digital base and young population have attracted interest from foreign players. Hungry's OTP Bank versus Development Bank of South Korea They have already established stores in Myanmar. Similarly, Société Générale of France, Kaspi of Kazakhstanversus Citi Bank of the US They are looking to enter the country.
“It's not that competitive these days.” But I'm sure there will be more and more competition as we move along in the next few years,” Hughes said.
TBC Uzbekistan, which also operates digital payment app Payme and Sharia-compliant credit business Payme Nasiya, had 16.9 million users as of September, up from 13.2 million users in December 2023 to 4.9 million users in December 2023. Net profit for the first nine quarters of this year was $27 million, and the financial year was $ More than 23 million. 2023, In addition, By 2025, it is projected to achieve a net profit of $75 million.