CVA Podcast: Laurent Jankowiak, Mazars

Transcript

[Music] hello hello and we are back for another bite-sized episode of the crypto valley association podcast let's discover together the up-and-coming trends of this restless space and try to shed some light on the mysteries it contains today we have loho jokoyek partner of mazars switzerland amazing to hear that you have doubled your workforce and turnover in only four years congratulations i'm looking forward to finding out if blockchain has or can contribute to that success and great let's drive straight into the world of hidden financial services here so lauren

a pleasure to have you here how are you doing hello ahmed i'm very very happy to to be here and to discuss about blockchain this very interesting topic with you and to share uh my point of view awesome so tell us what first got you personally engaged within cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology yeah uh it's not a very long time ago i one one come here for several years that blockchain and distributed ledger technology will change the face of the world of finance and in a time of disrupting innovations this is something that i can't ignore something that nobody

continue because this should be a part of our future and and we don't want to be disrupted yes right so by contrast this is something that we need to see and to understand through concrete examples if one day we want to adapt blockchain for our own business so the first and most famous use of blockchain technology was to create and administer digital or virtual coins such as bitcoin and digital tokens or cryptocurrencies these were typically devised for use as a transaction medium and store of value but nevertheless i must confess that first i was not convinced

that blockchain would become a must-have in every domain even for processes and operating models especially within the financial sector we have heard for several years if what it's called use cases not proofed and not often too far from business reality things from me started to change when i saw for the first time solutions went live within the commodities and trade finance processes activities in switzerland and when i learned more about the use of smart contracts since then i realized what blockchain could bring to us and how it could change the future of our day-to-day business yes and i think it's a great use case and so if

specifically uh within use cases is there something within smart contracts that has kept you here today that you're looking to draw yeah in financial services for the this industry we are looking for different solutions for different use cases in financial services and this is something that has been accelerated we've got 19 crises you know because things are going very fast and for everyone blockchain must be a part of broader digitization strategy use cases for process automation for example we could have following use cases with smart contracts that could provide speed and accuracy trust security and cost saving

what is the smart contracts the smart contracts are digital and automated so you will not have to spend time processing paperwork reconciling and correcting the errors that are often written into documents that have been filmed manually computer code is also more exact than the legalese that traditional contracts have written in because smart contract automatically execute transactions following predetermined rules and the encrypted records of these transactions are shared across participants just nobody has to question whether information has been altered for personal benefits yes i mean that's

when there can be a lot of issues right when it comes to bribery or or even falsification right of contracts and then it's right for example in your very right in banking you know your customer and anti-model entering process could be simplified actually onboarding seems much simpler with blockchain solution with the lt we may say so we have a database of verified clients that are in existence secured and sharable among different institutions the time it currently takes to collect from dirty gates that would be reduced significantly the overall changes to a client's status could be updated to the

entire network of institutions with near immediacy so this technology would clear many of the expenses for financial institutions as well as minimize the ambiguity that currently complicates lens opacity to the client's onboarding and monitoring processes and this is very powerful this is very very powerful indeed i couldn't agree more and maybe a little bit more about massage specifically so what role do you believe mazars plays within this growing industry and maybe you want to give some background as to what mazars are doing as well yeah first of all i will i would say what is mazar masas is an internationally integrated partnership

specializing in audit accountancy advisory attacks and legal services mozart is operating in 91 countries and territories around the world we draw on the expertise of 30 000 professionals 24 000 professionals in the mothers integrated partnerships and sixteen thousand there are the mothers north america audience to assist clients of all sizes at every stage in their development at a global level our audit activity represents about fifty percent of our revenues and advisory around 10 the rest is for tax services accounting

and outsourcing 32 and transaction and legal services 8 so you can see our current business is audit our core business is impacted by new digital technologies from others our listeners to operate as auditors is at stake and our industry needs deep transformation we want to reinvent our profession and create real value for our clients our people and society actually i think that mazars should adopt an agile approach by fostering the sharing of expertise provides its integrated group simultaneously to initiate the development of the dlt the blockchain

business in a mature hub of excellence like switzerland yes i mean susan is definitely i'm driving in it it's great to hear that mazzag is adapting to the innovation they see outside of what they're using now right i was just speaking with a dear friend of mine the other day about how well bigger corporations are not able to adapt to the new upcoming technologies are they bound to fail right whereby maybe a younger startup is going to be able to adapt solutions that are faster and more efficient and then they will be able to scale and grow while the other one declines so that's wonderful to hear yeah and the strategy of mothers is is more to be a smart follower and to to try to

to to find new partnership with startups or companies dedicated to blockchain technology and to share this technology with our expertise and to provide new services for the clients we are more smart followers we are not a leader in blockchain but we are trying to every day we try to to go a step further on that technology yeah i like that right smart followers i think there's always something more to learn and it's great to be keeping on your toes even as you're such a big corporation right still staying active during the environment is is great to hear and so so what role do you believe that massage plays within this growing industry

of blockchain technology it's a very good question actually i will reply with my my view as a consultant in financial services i am much more interested in what kind of improvement blockchain solution could concretely bring to financial institutions operating model and i believe in more automation for better course efficiency and less risks in process sales execution more security integrity of information transparency and a native audit trail and that could be already a lot of for an organization today and be a sufficient reason to put this

at the center of the digital transformation strategy program indeed but that shouldn't be an end in itself production in processes is more about communication technology that it means to change the standards and the way we work so uh this is also the the the rule for massage it is going to change the way we work finally this is why i came to the cda network looking for a concrete example of blockchain applications from different sectors trying to learn more from real experience and success stories let's say no more smoky ideas but more of true actions and concrete solutions

this is why i'm here actually and with mozart for me as a professional in financial services and for an audit and constructing firms as mothers it is pivotal to be part of this adventure so we are at the beginning we are still at the beginning as a smart follower tries to develop new solutions and to to continue to develop its community on the blockchain and this is how we we we will uh contribute to uh all the projects that the clients are willing to to develop uh in the future well we're happy to have you within the crypto valley association for sure and

then hopefully our network can help you further further those need and you spoke specifically about automation right and so has mazar's thought about using blockchain as an in-house solution to help with some of your automation as you're such a big firm now to be frank not today we started to develop prototypes internally much more to appropriate the technology and to be more familiar with that solution but we we didn't develop any solution yet internally but we have have ideas we have you know access to uh to use the blockchain to reduce the costs for example the replacements of massage

centralized and while delivering and inventory systems by streamlined blockchain for record keeping with reduced needs for intermediary functions such as administration and compliance checking throughout the group we have for example independence check processes that could be a solution and in addition storing data on the blockchain means the quality gap yeah and these more really this more really available data will then be used in our business analytics which will be more accurate and yet insights that will allow mozart's offices to reach their own objectives nice i see that well i'm happy as well

if you're looking at adventuring into this space on an internal level as well and that you've already started these processes and i can't wait to see in the future the the headlines of mazza's adopting blockchain technology internally and well i've been told that the best way to predict the future is to create it right so maybe on that point where do you think financial services are headed in the space as a whole this technology was you know we said with many of the expenses for financial institutions there are many other examples we could see in business process automation with blockchain and smart contracts and not only are with onboarding and monitoring processes

or onto money rendering but the blockchain the execution of business processes across multiple organizations where trust may be lacking but it also allows to imagine new business models and ways of working in the future blockchain technology and smart contracts will be implemented everywhere increasing traceability monitoring and security improving clients experience and reducing costs but it's not all thanks to these characteristics blockchain could also be an alley for socially responsible investment development and this is very interesting it would provide a verifiable and impossible to alter record as to who

buys what from whom it would allow a native traceability of the destination of the investments realized through blockchain and crypto assets prove the use of funds and their final positive impact for example some payment solutions are already reattributing a percentage of each transaction paid to an environmental or social cause so companies that are willing to give a proof that they reduce their environmental impacts can use blockchain to be transparent and very easily verified sustainability policies could be encrypted with smart contracts and all of this is coherent with the current change in

the mentality of consumers let me give you a last example within the circular economy blockchain will help to facilitate the traceability and transparent transparency providing consumers with information about truly sustainable products and enabling them to make their responsible choices that will also allow to suppress supply chain streamlining and at the end of the day the costs and wastewater reduction hmm i mean i definitely have to agree that sustainable development is definitely where the mentality of people are headed and you have companies that are saying okay for every 10 100 that you commit we will plant an

extra tree and being able to actually see that within the blockchain and not say that it's manipulated right because there are problems within various charities or charitable acts where you might donate but you don't know specifically where that money is going to or you might be trying to get into an initiative and you're not too sure about the local impact that it's having but it's true that with the record of data that blockchain is able to provide you're able to see okay this has gone specifically there so a very interesting one and i think that's again what you said in the beginning right being a smart follower is being able to see these adaptions modifications within the market where the trends are going and being able to adapt to that so that's wonderful to hear

yeah and i really believe like anybody that the technology will help the the the development of the sustainable development for for any any industry and not only financial services but here we have concrete example i think we can give solutions with blockchain to develop more traceable more transparent processes uh according to the sustainable development okay awesome well that's wonderful to hear and as we approach the end of this episode is there anything you'd like to share with our audience maybe your personal vision

for the future or any other anecdotes that you think would be interesting to share yeah i like very much to share with the crypto ballet association community i think there are a lot of people uh very interesting and who could give a lot for the blockchain development and our global community and to conclude blockchain is the future there is no choice it will seriously help to develop our society and the global economy in a better way more sustainable and to me i am convinced that this digital transformation can be achieved by co-creating blockchain joint venture

with strategic partners like we do in mozart's switzerland is a global blockchain hub under the political and regulatory inputs with a number of established players in the industry so we have all together a real chance to take part of this great adventure wonderful and you heard it here first right blockchain is the future so we'll revisit that statement in a couple of years and i very much hope you're right because i i fundamentally believe it will be uh as well and it already has changed so much of the world and it's going to do so even more so in the future so uh fantastic thank you for that and

well if you like this conversation feel free to check out more on our website cryptovalley.swiss where we host plenty of events educational content and even provide information on how you can join our growing community so thank you once again uh lauren for your time uh with us today and uh yeah stay tuned stay safe and until next time from the crypto valley in switzerland thank you thank you ahmed stay safe thank you [Music]