When the COVID-19 pandemic disrupted day-to-day work, SSI embarked on a company-wide digital transformation. Using a combination of tools including Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, and Azure, the firm turned the challenge into an opportunity, increasing sales and enhancing the customer experience. Its large employee network spread across multiple cities successfully transitioned to remote work.

SSI is Vietnam’s first privately licensed securities firm, and has increased its charter capital over 1,000 times in 20 years. It stayed at the forefront of innovation by using technology to improve its services. “We want to digitalize, not just so employees can work more effectively, but to create trade equity,” says Steve Yam, Chief Information Officer at SSI.

SSI laid the foundation for modern work in 2019 by adopting Microsoft 365 and Azure. This helped the company transition seamlessly to remote working when state-mandated lockdowns occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic. Today, more than 1,200 employees use Microsoft 365 for various tasks, from Teams for virtual communication to OneDrive and SharePoint for document management and sharing.

“The beauty of Microsoft solutions is how easy they are to use. It’s something familiar,” says Steve. “Changes happened gradually, making the transition extremely smooth.”

Data integration for better results

One of the company’s key challenges is bringing together decades of decentralized records and data. SSI needed to find a way to integrate all its customer information so employees can gain a nuanced understanding of its investment clients.

With the help of technology partner KPMG, the securities company implemented Dynamics 365 Customer Service as its customer relationship management (CRM) solution. The new tool gave SSI a comprehensive view of its over 300,000 clients. The platform captures all customer sales and trading transactions, creating individual profiles while instantly analyzing the data. Feeding this information into Power BI, traders now have access to real-time information to guide their sales. Because the solution was integrated with the company’s existing core-system and third-party applications, SSI can customize it with external modules for future development.

To complement this back-end upgrade, SSI also implemented enhancements in its customer-facing channels. The company introduced convenient trading options in its user-friendly web portal. An intuitive mobile app serves as a key touchpoint for the everyday investor. A pro trading feature offers advanced analytics and trading tools for professional investors. All these changes led to a better customer experience, resulting in higher customer satisfaction, greater customer loyalty, and sales growth.

Strict security measures

With large quantities of sensitive customer data going through its networks, security is a critical factor for the trading firm. Microsoft 365 Defender, packaged with the other solutions, combines real-time threat detection with strict firewalls and network security.

“We use a host of Microsoft services, and the best part is that all of these packages have been created with security control,” adds Steve. “I asked for a security system that was simple and easy to control. That’s what they delivered—four different internal clearance levels where only certain networks can access high-level documents.”

This is only the beginning of SSI’s digital transformation, as the company plans to extend its new CRM solution into the investment banking side of the business. “Our digital transformation will continue for many years. We want to streamline our working model together with Microsoft so that we can leverage the financial markets to better serve our loyal customers,” concluded Steve.

Thanh Thanh