Banks

MSC has more than 25 years of experience across Asia and Africa. We provide end-to-end consulting support to banks and other financial institutions. We help institutions grow their portfolios, expand outreach, improve operational efficiency, manage risk, and build sustainable, customer-centric financial services. 

Our banking practice covers six areas: product development, process design, and market expansion; digital transformation; legal transformation; regulatory compliance and risk assessment; capacity building and institutional assessment; and due diligence. We support financial product innovation through customer insights, behavioral research, and market intelligence. We help institutions digitize operations and delivery channels and integrate FinTech partnerships. We also support microfinance institutions (MFIs) in transitioning to differentiated or universal banks through pre-licensing capacity building and post-licensing change management. Our regulatory and risk advisory work includes social, economic, and operational impact assessments, risk analysis, scenario modeling, and monitoring systems. We strengthen institutional capabilities through training and capacity development. We also conduct due diligence on financial health, governance, risk, market positioning, and customer practices.

Agent banking enables financial institutions to deliver services through third-party agents, such as shops, pharmacies, and post offices. These services include account opening, cash deposits and withdrawals, loan disbursement and repayment, and other financial services. MSC has extensive experience in the design and scale-up of agent banking models and agent networks across Asia and Africa.  

Our work covers agent network strategy and design, recruitment and onboarding, training and certification, float and liquidity management, performance monitoring, grievance resolution, and gender-inclusive agent network development. We also help institutions strengthen agent sustainability and service delivery. 

We have conducted agent network assessments across 14 countries in Asia and Africa. Our experience includes work on digital and agent banking ecosystems across Africa, a branchless banking strategy in Indonesia, and agency banking expansion at BRAC Bank in Bangladesh. For BRAC Bank, we supported the development of an agency banking model, covering strategy, product design, commission structures, digital channels, and pilot testing. 

MSC helps banks expand financial inclusion through the design and expansion of financial products, delivery channels, and customer engagement strategies for underserved segments. These segments include rural households, urban low-income communities, micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs), and other underserved groups. Our work combines customer insights, behavioral research, product design, digital channel development, and implementation support. This approach improves access to relevant, sustainable financial services. 

We use tools such as financial diaries, focus groups, and behavioral diagnostics to understand customer needs and adoption barriers. These insights inform product and delivery models that improve access, usage, and customer engagement. Our experience includes financial inclusion pilots with Axis Bank in India and last-mile delivery channel optimization for payments banks. It also includes work on MSME finance, agricultural lending, and branchless banking across Asia and Africa.  

We help financial institutions expand meaningful access to financial services and strengthen service sustainability through research, product development, and channel design. 

MSC helps banks plan and implement digital transformation. We assess existing systems, identify operational and customer experience gaps, and develop technology-enabled strategies. These strategies align with each bank’s business objectives and market context. Our work focuses on digital banking operations, efficiency, customer experience, and financial inclusion. 

Our digital transformation work includes process automation; digital channel development across mobile, unstructured supplementary service data (USSD), agent, and merchant channels; FinTech partnership strategies; core banking system assessment; paperless onboarding; digital credit; and biometric adoption. We combine technology with customer-centric design to keep digital financial services trusted, affordable, and accessible, especially for low-income customers. Our work includes research on biometric adoption in Southeast Asia’s banking sector and on frameworks for non-cash-in cash-out (non-CICO) use cases.

MSC helps financial institutions navigate complex regulatory and operating environments. We design compliance and risk management frameworks that support informed business decisions and long-term resilience. Our work includes social, economic, and operational impact assessments; advanced risk analysis; scenario modeling; monitoring systems; and credit risk frameworks for micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) and agriculture portfolios. 

We also support institutions that undergo licensing changes through legal transformation. We help integrate regulatory requirements into business strategy, risk management, and operations. This approach enables institutions to manage risks proactively and aligns regulatory requirements with their strategic objectives. 

Micro, small, and medium enterprise (MSME) finance and agriculture lending present distinct challenges, which include limited credit histories, seasonal cash flows, and exposure to market and climate risks. MSC works with banks and financial institutions to address these challenges through lending strategies, product design, credit assessment, and risk management frameworks. These approaches expand access to finance while maintaining portfolio quality. Our experience includes credit scoring and risk assessment for informal businesses, working capital and receivables financing, and digital MSME lending strategies. It also includes business correspondent (BC) models, crop- and livestock-specific credit products, weather-indexed insurance, climate-resilient lending strategies, and agricultural portfolio strengthening. We also conduct due diligence for investors and development partners, including assessments of financial institution portfolios. 

In a co-lending arrangement for formal MSMEs, MSC has applied this expertise to support an end-to-end lending model. The model covers product design, credit assessment, business rule engine (BRE)-based decision-making, standard operating procedures (SOPs), documentation, and digital platform implementation and testing. It also covered institutional capacity building and borrower enablement. We strengthened management information systems (MIS) and provided continuous handholding to participating institutions. These interventions have reduced turnaround times, strengthened institutional understanding and execution through training and handholding, and minimized process bottlenecks. 

Our role extends from design through implementation and scale-up. We adapt operating models across geographies and strengthen institutional and technology readiness. We also incorporate implementation lessons to continuously improve the lending journey. This approach helps financial institutions to build MSME lending models that are well-designed, operationally ready, scalable, and responsive to the needs of borrowers and frontline institutions.