Innovation Via Automation : How A Leadapreneur Team Saved RM378K

In our Stars of the Accelerator series, we explore the transformation journey of the participants in the Leadapreneur Accelerator.

Ganesh Ramakrishnan and Manikandan Vijaykumar

Assistant Vice President Bankers, Ganesh and Manikandan, joined the Accelerator because they believe it is a great platform to maximize their potential and achieve the impossible. The pair joined forces to solve problems for their stakeholders.

Instead of picking a problem to solve, the team decided to listen to what their stakeholders need. They crowdsourced ideas by collecting feedback from multiple end users. After exploring many options, they decided to work on a solution to make Anti Money Laundering (AML) a more transparent process.

AML cases require review by the investigations team. Currently, in order to properly review cases, investigators have to put a lot of time and effort to collect accurate data. The manual method of data collection not only takes time, but it’s also prone to error.

Ganesh and Manikandan created a data collection tool called BEAM (Build Efficient AML Marvels).
To date, the tool has saved RM378k!
BEAM will help to;
- collect data faster using web automation
- ensure that the data is error and bias free
- free up time for investigators to pay closer attention to case reviews

Initially, the tool was developed using tools which had severe performance issues. The team persevered to address the issues. After extensive research and discussion with technical experts, they discovered that they should be using entirely different tools such as Java and Selenium. Though these technologies were new to them, the pair took the effort to educate themselves on the programming concepts.

Another challenge was that the automation tools were not readily available. With patience and perseverance, the team leveraged on their network of colleagues across regions and finally gained access to the tools and packages that they required.

Having no access to the case review applications, the team had to develop the BEAM using test environments and then synchronize the code with production systems.

Despite the hurdles, Ganesh and Manikandan managed to get their project results validated. They credit the Accelerator for giving them the confidence to see this project through. Their common motto is “Dream Big. Dream Impossible.”

Congratulations Ganesh and Manikandan in becoming Stars of the Accelerator!