President Lee Dae-houn, 2nd left, of NH Bank, meets with Director Allen Awoo in charge of the Banking Sector of the Hong Kong Financial Authority.

President Lee Dae-houn of NH Bank, left, shakes hands with President Steven Phillips of the Hong Investment Office in Hong Kong. (Photos: NH Bank)

President Lee Dae-houn of NH Bank has been spurring the expansion of the bank’s overseas operation in Hong Kong, where he arrived on Jan. 27. He visited a number of countries in southeast Asia, including Vietnam and Indonesia until Feb. 2 to search for ways to boost the bank’s operation in the Southeast Asian region.

President Lee said in Hong Kong that he led the work to apply for a license from the Hong Kong financial authorities to set up the bank’s branch there and set up a local subsidiary in Jakarta, Indonesia, while he sought to open a rep. office in Ho Chi Minh City in Vietnam.

The bank wants to tap the region’s high potential for an international financial center with its agricultural financial know-how as one of its strong points.

The bank wants to set up a special business model for each country in the region.

President Lee will visit New York in April to check on the bank’s globalization plan in view of the bank’s payment of an $11 million fine last year for its failure to uphold local money laundering laws. He said the CEO should travel to the overseas jobsites to check on the bank’s global operations himself.

Under what it dubbed "sustainable growth one plus management," the executives discussed ways to establish a sustainable business model whereby the firm's long term goal will be attained by a stable source of revenue, coupled with a continued risk management and customer-oriented services at the Jan. 25 meeting.

Another key objective in pursuit is digitalization, a key initiative among domestic and global financial services firms that require tighter integration among various sectors especially in the IT tech sector and the traditional financial services. In early December, the bank initiated around-the-clock operation of Robotics Process Automation (RPA), an automated program that manages household lending, corporate lending and credit card transactions.

The launch of the program is part of a digital transformation, whereby workers are spared the time and effort needed to carry out menial yet necessary tasks, in turn allowing them to focus more on high-value creative work.

A digital taskforce had been set up to maintain effective work distribution between 40 robots carrying out such repetitive work including a computerized program designed to ensure fast and accurate work free from human error. The approval of each review will undergo a final check with relevant department officials.

Distinguished by active interaction and engagement between human resources and the digital resources, the program will further boost customer satisfaction by offering improved real-time services, the bank added.