Retail Banking in CEE: Exploiting the Potential of ... - Roland Berger

PREFACE
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PREFACE
EFMA AND ROLAND BERGER STRATEGY CONSULTANTS DID A STUDY ON MICRO BUSINESS
STRATEGIES IN THE CEE REGION. COMPARING CEE BANKS, THEY IDENTIFIED BEST PRACTICES
AND IMPROVEMENT POTENTIAL.
Since 2009, banks in Central and Eastern Europe have had to shift their focus from growth to the definition of a
sustainable bank size and to the handling of non-performing loans (NPLs). Stopping the growth of NPL volumes, their
collection and workout was the most frequently discussed topic for some years but in 2011 something changed: in a
stabilized market, yet still under non-favorable market conditions, banks started to look for growth potentials. Several
institutions identified the micro business segment to be an interesting potential target group and analyzed the opportunities
and threats of smallest-size enterprises.
Given the increased interest in micro business in CEE, Efma and Roland Berger Strategy Consultants, kindly supported
by KBC Bank, conducted a study on micro strategies in the CEE region. The objective was to compare regional players'
practices and to identify key success factors and improvement potentials.
The report at hand contains the study results and provides an insight into how credit institutions in CEE handle the
micro segment, covering the following topics:
> Root causes of micro business attractiveness
> Applied segmentation models and their consequences
> Risk assessment techniques and change of importance
> Sales, service and communication channels
> Applied cross-segment offering techniques
For the study, managers of regional and local banks all across CEE were interviewed. The findings were combined with
the market knowledge of Roland Berger and the insights obtained during numerous projects in the region.
We are sure that the coming years will see a revolution and the invention of micro business in CEE banking. Thus the
importance of a proper micro strategy and the capability to implement is becoming a critical issue for each bank that
strives for a footprint in the CEE micro market. We believe that this report will support you and your organization in
assessing your micro business status and practice, in identifying improvement potential and consequently better coping
with the changed business environment in CEE.
Hendrik Bremer
Partner
Roland Berger Strategy Consultants
Patrick Desmarès
Secretary General
Efma