KARACHI: The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has recently selected Haball, through an independent and transparent bidding process, to act as the Supply Chain Finance (SCF) Multibank Technology Platform Service Provider. This milestone marks Haball’s dedicated commitment to revolutionising Digital Supply Chain Finance and enabling credit in the small and medium enterprises (SME) sector in Pakistan.

After careful consideration and guidance from industry leaders and SBP officials, Haball has been chosen as a Multi-Bank Supply Chain Financing Platform by the SBP. As Pakistan’s first B2B Fintech Company, Haball has digitised supply chain collections for its clients and brought efficiency to their business processes. Pakistan is home to 5.2 million SMEs; however, only 0.25 percent of the business community in Pakistan has access to digital banking services, while the majority relies on traditional brick-and-mortar operations.

“The digitisation of the supply chains is a $5 billion opportunity in the country, and roughly 1.5 percent of that value moves through financial services in a manual, broken process that takes 2-3 days for a single transaction,” said Omer Bin Ahsan, the CEO of Haball. This estimate highlights the potential of the opportunity this platform can address by digitising the supply chain financing process.

Haball’s flagship product, Wisaaq, has already achieved remarkable success. By empowering manufacturers and SMEs to reduce reliance on cash-based transactions and streamline the reconciliation and financing process, which is completely Shariah compliant. Within five months of its commercial launch, Haball had processed $21 million and facilitated digital collections of $12 million in repayments.

This selection aligns with the State Bank’s ongoing efforts to promote Islamic financing, especially after the recent verdict by the Federal Shariat Court on the adoption of Islamic Banking, and the prioritisation by the Federal Government and SBP to have a structured implementation plan for Riba-Free banking. By employing Islamic principles of transparency, fairness, and risk-sharing, augmented by digital supply chain entrenchment, SMEs and corporate supply chains can scale their business operations through the liquidity provided by the banks.

“In addition to the supply chain financing for a bank, it will actually offer substantial cross-selling opportunities to the bank because the banks would now have substantial data about the distributor,” emphasised Dr Inayat Hussain, the Deputy Governor of SBP at the Cashless Supply Chain Event 2022. By digitising collections and streamlining financial operations, Haball provides businesses with greater access to working capital, de-risks corporate balance sheets from receivables, and provides the banks with secure agnostic digital payments with same-day settlements and cross-selling opportunities. This paves the way for sustainable economic growth nationwide and Islamic financial inclusion.—PR