To increase customer convenience and retain business, Ashikaga Bank – a regional bank based in the northern part of Kanto, Japan – explored initiatives to reduce or eliminate physical documents and automate documentation by robotic process automation (RPA) and the latest technology. It launched a business process reform (BPR) program to provide employees with the newest IT tools. The bank wanted to increase the efficiency of its mortgage loan screening operations with the following goals:

• Decrease the number of business days required for loan approvals
• Reduce the number of documents required of customers
• Cut the bank’s administrative operations costs
• Reduce manual workload by half by shifting paper documentation to digitalisation

The BPR promotion office selected Microsoft Power Platform, as Ashikaga Bank recognised:

• Power Platform can support business process reform.
• Microsoft SharePoint can be used as a database.
• Advanced connectors in Power Apps can easily communicate with systems used for different business purposes.
• A low-code development tool can enable employees outside of the bank’s systems department to develop applications themselves.

Because Ashikaga Bank was using Power Platform for the first time, the bank sought expert support for its proof of concept (PoC) and partnered with Avanade. Together, we determined the systems to be verified by the PoC and confirmed its feasibility. Two applications were developed in Microsoft Power Apps: one for Ashikaga Bank’s headquarters and another for its loan centre.

Ashikaga Bank confirmed that Power Platform is optimal for a seamless mortgage loan screening process after having conducted the PoC with Avanade. The loan application will be gradually rolled out to the 15 Ashikaga Bank loan centres, providing a seamless business operation and digitalisation.

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