First Dawood Islamic Bank Ltd (FDIBL) has chosen System Access' flagship product SYMBOLS to deliver a world-class Islamic banking solution fully compliant with Shariah principles and Islamic religious law.

System Access already provides Islamic financial products as "windows" offerings in its conventional banking suite, SYMBOLS currently deployed at several banks in Pakistan and Middle East. First Dawood Islamic Bank Ltd will be the company’s first full fledge Islamic bank. "This win is significant to our strategies and a testimony to our efforts to ride the Islamic banking wave in the region and globally. We have poured investments in research and development funds raised in our Initial Public Offering in 2005 and will continue to do so to ensure our competitiveness in this market space" said Leslie Loh, Chairman, CEO and Founder System Access.

With Pakistan's financial sector witnessing a very robust growth in Islamic banking, and total Islamic banking assets almost tripled to 54 billion rupees in the fiscal year ended June 30 from 18.8 billion rupees a year earlier, FDIBL is poised to take advantage of this growing segment of the financial services market. With more than 20 branches and banking outlets planned in the next 3-5 years, FDIBL intends to broaden the current products and service offered in Pakistan.

FDIB's CEO, Mr Nikolaus Rafiq Schwarz has clearly set sights on his mission to make the Customer his number 1 priority - "My goal is serve my customers and to bring these customers world class banking products and services based on Shariah law. To serve my customers, I need a system that is designed to make the customer the focus of my entire operations. At FDIBL we want to intimately know and understand our customer and in doing so provide excellent customer service and care". In choosing System Access as their trusted solution provider and partner, FDIBL joins an a growing list of customers who have successfully implemented and benefiting from System Access' customer centric solution, SYMBOLS.

SYMBOLS is a suite of banking products and processes which has evolved over 20 years of product innovation. SYMBOLS adopts Islamic banking practices and Shariah compliance without explicit engineering and re-engineering through System Access' unique approach of "Composition through Decomposition". Through this process, FDIBL stands to benefit from the product's flexibility and scalability to achieve its strategic growth of the Islamic bank.

"We are proud to have First Dawood Islamic Bank Ltd as our customer. We intend to work closely and lend our implementation experience to the bank to ensure their strategic intention is achieved. System Access will continue to develop Pakistan as a strategic market – hiring local resources and building on its business philosophies of being "global yet local" says Krishnamoorthy Ramoo Vice President and Head, Pakistan Office.

"We are very happy to work with System Access. The company has a proven implementation methodology, good reputation, and broad experience in Pakistan for timely and successful delivery. Most important, System Access is committed to this country and has built its offices and resources right here in Karachi" says Mr. Rafiq Dawood, Chairman First Dawood Islamic Bank.