Mohammed bin Zayed attends the first Ramadan session titled "The Future of Financial Systems in the Age of Smart Technologies"

His Highness Sheikh Khalid bin Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi, attended the first Ramadan session organized by the Mohammed bin Zayed Council in its current season under the title "The Future of Financial Systems in the Age of Smart Technologies".

The session - which was held at the Council's headquarters in Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque in Abu Dhabi - was addressed by Jim Marus, founder of the Digital Banking Report and an expert in future studies and handling disruptions in the financial sector.

The speaker discussed the impact of artificial intelligence in reshaping the banking sector, which creates opportunities and challenges including the development of consumer expectations, who now want participation, dialogue and understanding of their needs by financial institutions, not just a "good experience".

He also touched on some of the challenges facing institutions to invest in technology, which is the lack of people with foresight and willing to keep pace with development and adopt the future of artificial intelligence, vision and transformation, even if the best technologies are available.

The financial expert explained what financial institutions must do to gain a high level of trust from consumers, to transform the way they deal with institutions, noting that traditional office systems "that do not deal directly with customers" must keep pace with this in order to support the ongoing transformation.

He sees the importance of "providing access to data", and said that consumers have come to expect to receive a customized experience for their requirements, noting that large-scale innovation is happening quickly, driven by data, analytics and technology.

He called for the importance of adopting artificial intelligence systems and constantly asking questions about them, as the skills of asking questions about artificial intelligence systems are the tools of the future.

The session witnessed a group discussion on the topic, in which Hana Al Rostamani, CEO of First Abu Dhabi Bank Group, Abdullah Al Mansouri, Managing Partner at I3H Investment, and Firas Jalbout, Founder and CEO of Baraka Company participated. The session was moderated by Shatha Al Shamsi, Strategy Consultant at EY Parthenon.