Scopeer

ScopeerSecure, reliable, locally hosted infrastructure cloud for your FinTechCase Study

About ScopeerScopeer is the first crowdfunding platform established in Saudi Arabia, that allows entrepreneurs to raise funds by offering a portion of the public and private equity. Scopeer also offers investors the opportunity to invest in entrepreneurial projects, promising access to entrepreneurs and startups. The crowdfunding firm aims to support small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in securing funding to expand their businesses in the Saudi market. Scopeer’s platform will provide investment and financing solutions to SMEs by offering their shares to investors. As part of Scopeer’s core business as offering manager, it conducts studies on the firms’ financial position, credit score, and risk levels, in cooperation with Saudi credit reporting firms, in order to provide investors with enough data. Based on the permit by CMA Scopeer will be able to experiment with the crowdfunding FinTech which allows investors to participate in funding small and medium-sized enterprises in exchange for shares in such enterprises. The service is provided through an electronic platform owned and monitored by Scopeer. Scopeer to fulfill this objective needed a technology service provider who would be able to provide them secure, reliable/available, locally hosted servers, top-notch connectivity, and quality service. While providing all the technology-related infrastructure and services, the vendor also must make sure the regulatory/compliance risks are covered for Scopeer.

Saudi Arabia vision 2030KSA is the largest economy in the GCC region. It totaled $786.5 billion in 2018 and constituted 48% of the collective GCC GDP of $1,650.6 billion. Saudi Arabia’s economy grew at a pace of 2.2 percent in 2018, sustained by strong oil sector growth. The economy recovered from a contraction in 2017 when the economy was hurt by weak oil prices. Due to the weakening of oil prices, Saudi Arabia felt the need to reduce dependence on oil. Vision 2030 laid the strategy to diversify the economy and develop public service sectors such as health, education, infrastructure, recreation, and tourism. The Kingdom is attempting to generate more revenue through the introduction of new taxes and fees, including VAT, extra fees on ex-pats working in KSA, and reducing the fuel subsidies. In order to fund the Vision 2030 strategy, Saudi Arabia also initiated the IPO of Saudi Aramco (the largest IPO to date in the world). The Saudi government is taking steps to make its Vision 2030 transformation program more manageable and achievable. Putting the fiscal position of the country on a sustainable footing is one key element of this process. While this fiscal effort is still a work in progress, the degree of financial accountability, oversight, and transparency that has been achieved over the past few years has been considerable. As a part of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030, the Kingdom has developed a roadmap aimed at enhancing its business environment and economic performance by diversifying the economy and reforming regulations to attract foreign investment. Government stimulus across the technology and financial sectors paired with relaxed foreign investment regulation have underlined the Kingdom’s efforts to promote ease of doing business in the country.

Kingdom’s digital transformation & need for securityCloud adoption in Saudi Arabia spiked in 2018 following announcements from Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, and Alphabet that they were to establish datacenters in the country. Cloud forms an integral component of the DX initiatives that are underway at many organizations in the country. The use of innovation accelerator technologies (i.e., IoT, machine learning, AI, blockchain, robotics, and automation) in Saudi Arabia is growing. Enterprises are increasingly becoming driven by data as they internally transform their operations and attempt to open new markets and deliver better customer experiences. Blockchain pilots are also beginning to emerge. While progress on the blockchain front is subdued at present, pilots are nonetheless creating new ecosystems, partnerships, and business models among solution providers and across verticals like banking, healthcare, and the public sector. The proliferation of 3rd Platforms technologies such as cloud, big data and analytics, enterprise mobility, and socially enabled business technologies has drastically increased the attack surface of organizations. Vulnerabilities arising from adopting these technologies have certainly driven most Saudi organizations to reevaluate their approach to security, but innovation accelerators such as IoT, artificial intelligence, and machine learning have further complicated most companies’ security posture. Nevertheless, most digital transformation initiatives ongoing in both the public and private sectors are built on a foundation of 3rd Platform technologies and innovation accelerators and therefore have plans to implement advanced security solutions in the coming years. Security remains a top priority for organizations in terms of operations and infrastructure as cyberattacks continue to grow unabated. Organizations in Saudi Arabia will continue to allocate substantial portions of their ICT budgets to streamlining security processes

SAMA, CMA & fintech in SaudiFinTech encompasses a broad range of technology software used to provide financial services. This includes applications used to accept mobile payments, crowd funders, cryptocurrencies, algorithms used for trading and investing advice, and applications used by consumers to track their spending habits and take control of their personal finances. While advancement in FinTech opens the potential for innovation, it also increases exposure to regulatory and compliance risks. For FinTech’s the financial regulation in KSA is governed by two regulators, The Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority and the Capital Market Authority (CMA), each with a set of financial services under their jurisdiction. While SAMA regulates all companies that are involved in banking, financial, and insurance services. Even if the entity is not regulated/ licensed by SAMA, the nature of the financial activities may still be regulated by SAMA. On the other hand, the basic objective of CMA is to create an appropriate investment environment, boost confidence, reinforce transparency and disclosure standards in all listed companies, and protect the investors and dealers from illegal acts in the market. CMA regulates capital market activities like dealing, arranging, managing, advising, and custody. Even if the entity is not regulated/ licensed by CMA, the nature of the financial activities may still be regulated by CMA. Saudi Arabian Monetary Authority (SAMA) has recently designed a sandbox regulatory environment to understand and assess the impact of new technologies in the financial services and products market in the Kingdom and to help transform it into an intelligent financial center, allowing local and international companies wishing to test new digital solutions to enter the environment to be launched in the Kingdom soon. This step aims at achieving several strategic objectives of linking the sandbox environment with the Kingdom’s Vision 2030, which aims at promoting economic growth and boosting investment activities by moving into a cashless society and by promoting the principle of financial inclusion.