Cedacri invests €350 million in technology to bring fintech closer to banks

Founded 44 years ago, Cedacri can be considered the forerunner of the Italian fintech sector. Very well known among professionals, less to the general public, Cedacri is the largest Italian company specializing in IT outsourcing services for the banking sector.

Born as a consortium company of private banks, the current shareholder base sees the Strategic Fund (Cdp) with 27% while the rest of the capital is fractionated among 14 banks including Mediolanum with 17%. For some time, however, Cedacri has been a market operator, and no longer captive, so much so that the revenues generated by the shareholder banks are less than 50% of the total.

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The company’s turnover could reach $471 million (€400 million) in 2020

ln 2020, also thanks to the recent outsourcing contract of Deutsche Bank Italia, Cedacri’s turnover will reach almost $471 million (€400 million). However, the growth targets to 2024, according to the new three-year business plan just approved, aim at further development both in current activities and in new business lines. “The objectives of the new plan aim to reach a turnover that will exceed $647 million (€550 million) by 2024, with an investment plan of $412 million (€350 million) that will focus, among other things, on technological improvement in the cloud and open banking services, while increasing the number of employees from the current 2,400 to almost 3,000,” explained in this interview with IlSole24Ore CEO Corrado Sciolla, “engine” of the company’s development in recent years.

This growth is part of the transformation process that has been going on for years in the banking sector: use of the digital channel, increasingly appreciated by customers; margin squeeze, both because of low-interest rates and the impact of the Psd2 directive on commission income. “In this context, the need to keep costs under control and to share some IT investments has increased in banks – explained Sciolla – and Cedacri has proposed itself as a technological engine to manage outside the banks, in addition to IT platforms, also some onerous and “repetitive” services such as those for compliance, in particular for anti-money laundering and related reports to the Bank of Italy and ECB.” 

This sector, which is part of the vertical solutions provided by Cedacri to clients, has been enhanced with the acquisition of the specialized company Oasi and then with that of CAD.it for securities back office services in Italy and Spain.

Cedacri’s best-known activity is still the management of core banking information systems platforms for over 40 institutions and 2,400 branches, the third Italian player behind the two big Intesa Sanpaolo and UniCredit. A traditional activity that Cedacri intends to grow with the acquisition of new customers in the small and medium sized banks. To these services the group aims to add “the development of new businesses such as open banking.”

The new business plan also foresees growth outside Italy, with priority focus in Spain, France, Switzerland and Germany. “But it will be a growth without making acquisitions,” explains Sciolla who rather looks at aggregation operations. And the listing on the stock exchange is a hypothesis for the company to grow? “In addition to consolidation with other players, the IPO is a hypothesis that we are considering. But the decision is up to the shareholders.”

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(Featured image by Tumisu via Pixabay)

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First published in Il Sole 24 ORE, a third-party contributor translated and adapted the article from the original. In case of discrepancy, the original will prevail.

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