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Bank Islam Malaysia has recently launched its social finance initiative, Sadaqa House. It aims to provide products and services to collect sadaqah, waqf and hibah. The public can contribute to realising social finance projects for sectors such as healthcare, education and entrepreneurship through the bank’s digital crowdfunding partnership with Ethis Ventures and GlobalSadaqa.com. Bank Islam CEO Khairul Kamarudin said the bank was utilising technology in its Shariah solutions to deliver a service that is aligned with the current digital trend. Also, contributors can ensure the funds contributed are being channelled accordingly and track the progress of the chosen project. Ethis Ventures founder Umar Munshi said the platform was not limited to Muslims and Malaysians. Any amount of money can be donated by the public into the Sadaqa House fund account, while Bank Islam will match the raised fund at the rate of 1:1 to a maximum of RM500,000.

In this interview Khairul Kamarudin, CEO of Bank Islam Malaysia, talks about his leadership style and areas of focus. Besides sustainability, the other main area of focus will be digitalisation. In 2016 the bank launched the innovative product called 'e-Donation' Terminal using Visa PayWave, a platform where donations can be made through the contactless electronic method using any debit/credit card. Bank Islam has also taken a step towards accepting fintechs with the recent strategic collaboration with Cognizant. This will allow the bank to embark more on innovative digital Islamic banking. In terms of charity, Bank Islam has its own Waqf project in its office building, which provides prayer facilities to more than 3,000 people per week. Also, the bank supports the affordable development project in Selangor and a school-construction project in the state of Perlis.

Bank Islam Malaysia Bhd is aiming to grow its mobile banking customer base from currently 900,000 users to two million by the year 2019. This is part of the bank’s strategic collaboration with US-based global business and technology consulting company Cognizant to develop fintech products within the network of Bank Islam’s. The banks digital banking segment accounts for less than 5% of its non-fund based income and the bank plans to increase this figure to 10%.
Bank Islam chief executive officer Khairul Kamarudin said the bank expected to roll out at least one fintech product related to retail banking by the second quarter of 2018. The bank planned to develop fintech products targeted at the retail banking and small and medium enterprise segments. “Together with Cognizant, we shall identify suitable fintech products that allow better customer engagement, to be submitted to Bank Negara’s regulatory sandbox,” he said.

In this interview deputy CEO of Bank Islam in Malaysia, Khairul Kamarudin, talks about the challenges Bank Islam had to face during the years. The bank had heavy losses in 2005 and 2006 and had to manage the misconceptions of the public as well. Today, Bank Islam’s customers have grown to more than 5 million. The bank was one of the four founding Islamic banks to form a consortium that launched the Investment Account Platform (IAP) in 2015. The IAP platform facilitates direct investment by investors into viable ventures of their choice. Bank Islam is involved in several social projects and foundations, like the Projek Bantuan Rumah (Housing Aid Project) and Promoting Intelligence, Nurturing Talent and Advocating Responsibility (PINTAR) Foundation.

Bank Islam Malaysia targets its financing segment to grow about 20 per cent to 25 per cent this year. Its Director of Business Development Khairul Kamarudin said the target would be achieved through the introduction of four new products related to technology and microfinancing. He added that all the products will be novelty to the market. However, the bank has not obtain any regulatory approvals yet. Khairul said the bank is also targeting to reduce further its non-performing loan (NPL) ratio and to increase its retail deposits by 15 per cent this year.