The findings* show that access to funding, risk management and improving usability are top of mind for treasurers today. Looking three years ahead, these challenges are expected to diversify to include demand for real-time capabilities and liquidity optimization, meaning new business models, which will drive a greater focus on open platforms for banks to deliver enhanced services at scale.

Today’s top three key priorities for corporate treasurers are:
• 84% Improve access to funding
• 57% Predict and manage risk
• 53% Improve usability and staff productivity
By 2022, treasurers expect their priorities to change and diversify:
• 59% Get real-time data and payments
• 54% Improve access to funding
• 52% Predict and manage risk

47% of corporate treasurers see opportunities for banks to improve their product offerings to provide more innovative solutions - beyond traditional services. This presents opportunities for banks to partner with ecosystem players and deliver value-added services.

“APIs and cloud-based solutions will be critical if banks are to deliver on the changing requirements outlined by corporate treasurers,” said Torsten Pull, Senior Vice President & General Manager for Corporate Banking at Finastra. “Open Banking and evolving treasury technologies are transforming the corporate sector, forcing financial service providers to evaluate the role they want to play in the digital ecosystem. We’re also seeing changes in both bank and corporate treasury business models, with greater importance placed on collaboration and choice, particularly through the creation of digital treasury platforms. Platforms like Finastra’s FusionFabric.cloud will allow banks and their corporate clients to co-innovate and co-develop new solutions.”

The new IDC Infobrief, Treasury Ecosystems- Opening Today for Tomorrow, reinforces this fundamental change to transactional business and operating models. Most notably, they expect that the increasing impact of intelligence, automation and the ecosystem will result in the emerging role of the Platform Player. Organizations that take this route will re-engineer their business models, becoming end-to-end service providers to the customer. The combination of cloud, hyper-automation and data analytics will allow banks to use their data, operations, license and technology to deliver Business Process as a Service propositions. Other models include Product Providers, focused on incremental improvement of services, and Relationship Banks which will re-invent customer relationships and act as a trusted advisor.

Thomas Zink, Research Director at IDC writes in the research, “The finance function is transforming at pace, led in large part by the growing importance of the role of the corporate treasurer, and treasury more broadly - now recognized as an essential change agent for the business. […] With this role change, we are witnessing the transformation of the treasury department into a data-driven, highly automated arbiter, equipped to optimize liquidity and enable future investments, and able to predict and hedge against volatilities in the market better than ever before.”