SeABank’s Remarkable Journey: From Local Bank to Leading Innovator in Sustainable Growth and Women’s Empowerment

In 2023, SeABank supported women-owned businesses in boosting competitiveness and status through high-value solutions. By the end of the year, the number of women-owned CC in SeABank rose by 148% from the previous year.

SeABank, originally established as Hai Phong Commercial Joint Stock Bank in 1994, underwent significant evolution over the years. In 2002, it was renamed Southeast Asia Commercial Joint Stock Bank (SeABank) and relocated its head office to Hanoi in 2005. Transitioning to a retail banking model in 2009, SeABank opened a representative office in Ho Chi Minh City in 2011 and became one of the first banks in Vietnam to accept all international cards.

SeABank has been recognized for its contributions to socio-economic development, receiving various accolades including the third-class and second-class Labor Medals. In 2017, it transformed to a customer-centric operating model and adopted core values emphasizing community orientation, transparency, and sustainability in 2018.

In subsequent years, SeABank expanded its charter capital and gained recognition for its financial stability, receiving a B1 credit rating from Moody’s in 2019 and upgrading its outlook to positive in 2021. SeABank launched the SeAMobile digital banking app in 2020 and was honored as a National brand.

By 2023, SeABank increased its charter capital to VND 24,957 billion, secured its inclusion in the MSCI Frontier Markets Index and VN30-Index, and continued its dedication to excellence by receiving the first-class Labor Medal for Outstanding Achievement in work from 2018 to 2022.

The Silicon Review reached out to Ms. Le Thu Thuy, Vice Chairman of the BOD, and here’s what she had to say.

Interview Highlights

Q. How does SeABank prioritize its services to cater to the needs of professional households and small to medium-sized businesses while simultaneously addressing the demands of larger organizations?  

Green credit

Since 2021, SeABank has been seeking international funding to support green credit initiatives, aiming to contribute to the National Strategy on Green Growth and support environmentally friendly industries and fields. This includes areas such as green agriculture, renewable energy, and sustainable water management in both urban and rural areas.

In line with its international cooperation strategy with partners like the IFC, SeABank launched an incentive program in 2023 to promote green credit growth and help BUs focus on attracting customers with environmentally friendly business activities. SeABank also strengthened its partnership with the IFC in 2023 to implement training and enhance the ability to identify, consult, and evaluate green projects for future green credit disbursement.

Accompany women-owned businesses with a series of products and services of preferential credit

In 2023, SeABank supported women-owned businesses in boosting competitiveness and status through high-value solutions. By the end of the year, the number of women-owned CC in SeABank rose by 148% from the previous year.

With guidance from major international organizations, SeABank continued to offer comprehensive support to women-owned SMEs through tailored policy packages featuring financial and non-financial services, including lending, guarantees, trade finance, and account services. The bank offered a special credit package for WSMEs with incentives like a free first year of a Visa Corporate credit card with a limit of up to VND 200 million and free early repayment.

In 2023, SeABank launched the SeAPower women’s club, providing specialized non-financial benefits to female leaders and women-owned businesses. Members received comprehensive care at SeABank branches, participated in exclusive forums, accessed training courses, and attended private parties. Non-financial incentives included products and services in beauty, fashion, tourism, and gifts for premium members on special holidays.

To support the development of women-owned businesses, SeABank partnered with the Vietnam Association of Women Entrepreneurs to host forums and seminars, and launched community campaigns like roadshows in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. The Ladies Lounge podcast series showcased stories from businesswomen, reflecting the powerful and inspiring image of Vietnamese female leaders.

Loan products for members of the Women’s Union - SeAWomen

Since June 2016, SeABank has offered a loan product for members of the Women’s Union called SeAWomen. The product features free early repayment and streamlined application procedures. It plays a significant social role by supporting women’s economic development and improving their quality of life. This product provides safe and transparent credit, reducing reliance on black credit in society. SeAWomen offers unsecured consumer loans, ensuring broad accessibility due to its appealing features and social impact. By the end of 2023, SeAWomen products had a total debt balance of nearly VND 800 billion, a 60% increase from 2022.

SeALady international credit card

Since August 2017, SeABank has introduced the SeALady international credit card, offering cashback of up to 2% on transactions, especially on women’s special days such as birthdays, March 8, and October 20, as well as at insurance, healthcare, and beauty partner outlets.

With SeALady cards, SeABank supports cancer patients by donating VND 2,000 to the Bright Tomorrow Fund for each customer transaction over VND 1 million.

Given the significant contribution of women as founders, administrators, and executives, SeABank aims to be the preferred bank for women-owned businesses. The bank focuses on enhancing its reputation, ensuring transparency and sound practices, and supporting female customers and entrepreneurs. Consequently, SeABank has secured nearly USD 600 million in credit packages from leading financial institutions like DFC, IFC, and international investment funds to support SMEs, green credit, and women-owned business support.

Q. What specific banking products and services does SeABank offer to its clients?

The main types of services that SeABank provides in the market include intermediary financial services such as 1) Capital mobilization services;2) Loan services; 3) Discounting services, rediscounting of transfer instruments and other valuable papers; 4) Bank guarantee services; 5) Domestic and international payment services; 6) Credit card issuance services; 7) Payment and fund management services; 8) Foreign exchange services in domestic and international markets as regulated by law; and 9) Agent banking services. Other services as specified in the Business Registration Certificate.

Q. How does SeABank retain talented employees and maintain high workforce commitment? Explain the significance of a loyal, dedicated team and its impact on the bank’s success and competitive advantage.

SeABank’s resource development strategy aligns with its sustainable development goals and emphasizes improving the Employee Value Proposition (EVP). The bank focuses on a corporate culture built on core values, transparency, and empowerment to create a sustainable work environment. Activities led by the Union and the bank’s Communications & Marketing Department promote staff cohesion and a shared sense of purpose.

The HR policy system, developed with input from leading HR partners, offers attractive benefits and incentives to attract and retain high-quality personnel. The bank uses KPIs to evaluate and recognize individual contributions and plans human resources according to a career roadmap and talent pool. Payment policies are based on market data references.

Training programs, capacity assessments, and adjacent team development are designed to enhance employee skills and potential. SeABank uses innovative training methods like blended learning and e-learning to save costs and improve efficiency. Coaching, mentoring, and experience-sharing are integral parts of the bank’s approach.

SeABank prioritizes employee engagement and satisfaction through competitive benefits and incentives. Initiatives like Teambuilding and sports activities engage and boost staff morale. Annual programs honor long-serving employees and provide meaningful New Year gifts.

The bank demonstrates commitment to community and environmental responsibility through SeAGreen campaigns, SeARun events, and support for cancer patients and disadvantaged students.

SeABank continuously assesses and refines its HR policies and practices to improve employee experience, happiness, and cohesion, strengthening the bank’s overall resilience and success.

Q. What new endeavors is SeABank currently undertaking? Development strategy to 2026

SeABank has devised a core development strategy for 2021-2026 to build and develop into the most popular retail bank. With the achievements achieved in recent years, to achieve the goal, SeABank has set a number of indicators and criteria for evaluating performance by 2026, namely the following:

Specific strategy with SMART criteria: By 2026, SeABank hopes to reach 10 million customers, with NoII proportion accounting for more than 38% of total income, 70% online transaction rate, 36% CIR ratio and less than 3% of NPL ratio.

Become a leader in community contribution and organizational culture: SeABank aims to become a leading bank in contributing to the community and developing organizational culture. To implement its strategy, SeABank started implementing Environmental and Social Management System (ESMS) from January 2022 and updated some key parts continuously. ESMS helps SeABank check borrowers and screen for risks to children and forced labor, track, monitor and report greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions of SeABank and its borrowers, apply IFC Performance Standards (PS) into the ESRM Process to review risk for high-risk transactions including various financial products such as syndication and equity financing.

ESMS is applied to most transactions at SeABank including IC, TF, guarantee, microfinance, SME customers, LCC, climate finance, project finance and equity financing. This is an important step to help SeABank ensure that its business activities not only bring benefits to the bank itself but also contribute positively to the sustainable development of society.

In 2024, based on the results of the review of environmental and social impacts, SeABank will continue to study and evaluate the feasibility, plan to apply the principles of Responsible Banking and study the registration process for UNEP FI membership.

Value chain and growth drivers

SeABank has provided comprehensive financial solutions for large enterprises through its value chain. This solution not only provides financial solutions but also helps the Bank strengthen its existing customer portfolio and expand its customer network. SeABank’s value chain consists of three main parts: input resources, products and output values, done with stakeholders such as Large Corporate Banking Division, SME Banking Division and Retail Banking Division. Specifically:

• In 2022, SeABank completed the process of exploiting and managing chain customers. In which, Large Corporate Banking Division plays the role of the leading block of the chain, including connecting and leading the SME Banking Division, the Retail Banking Division to cooperate in the value chain, the ecosystem of the Large Corporate Banking (Anchor); chain cross-selling, Anchor’s ecosystem for the SME Banking Division, the Retail Banking Division and the focal point for Anchor’s feedback to coordinate with the SME Banking Division, the Retail Banking Division to increase service quality. SME Banking Division, Retail Banking Division play the role of implementing blocks, including: directly deploying and selling products, serving customers in the chain and ecosystem according to management segment and develop appropriate products.
• The approach to each value chain of large enterprises is not the same, so in addition to chain products by industry and field such as real estate (“Factoring for contractors, suppliers of strategic investors”), automobiles (“Sponsoring car distribution agency”), SeABank also approached each specific Anchor to build the right product for each specific chain, like “Sponsoring a distribution agent of Honda Vietnam” applying to the Honda automobile chain, and “Sponsoring a distribution agent of Thaco” applying to the Thaco automobile chain.
• SeABank’s banking and financial services and products links for a rich, diverse and flexible ecosystem, for example: 1) For Anchor as the project investor - the banking and financial products and services being linked and deployed are funding for investors, sponsoring suppliers (contractors, suppliers of building materials), end-user funding (individuals, businesses buying and using products and services of projects: home loans, card issuance and incentive programs for cardholders to use golf course services, hotels, etc.), providing products and services for partners’ staff (payroll, cards, loans to staff). 2) For the automobile company (Thaco) - the banking and financial products and services being linked and deployed are: granting credit lines to subsidiaries, sponsoring Thaco automobile distribution agents, sponsoring end-user (individuals, businesses borrowing to buy Thaco cars).
• SeABank is implementing the value chain with many large partners, not limiting the market, but choosing the right partner and meeting the risk appetite for cooperation implementation such as airlines (Vietnam Airlines), service providers (VNPT, Vietnam Post), project investors, car companies, distribution companies in the Group’s ecosystem (Central Group: BigC, Nguyen Kim; BRG Group, BRG mart, and Hapro mart).

Growth drivers and advantages for SeABank to implement the 2023-2026 strategy

SeABank is implementing the 2023-2026 strategy with factors that create growth drivers and advantages such as finance, digital technology, governance, environment, and society, etc. These factors have significantly contributed to SeABank’s value chain and strategy implementation, helping to increase operational efficiency and improve customer experience.

Finance: SeABank has abundant capital and is able to mobilize capital from different sources to invest in potential and highly profitable areas. This gives the bank the ability to strengthen its credit operations and expand its operations, which in turn leads to revenue and profit growth.

Digital technology: SeABank has invested heavily in digital technology to improve and optimize its operations. The application of new technologies such as artificial intelligence, blockchain, big data and cloud computing enhances the bank’s operational efficiency, enhances innovation, and serves customers better. This helps in revenue and profit growth.

Governance: SeABank has a professional and advanced governance policy, thereby ensuring that the bank’s operations are organized effectively. The risk management system is constantly updated and operating procedures are implemented according to international standards, reducing risks and increase customer trust. This helps the bank maintain efficient operations, increase revenue and profit.

Environment: SeABank has policies and activities to protect the environment, towards using renewable energy sources and minimizing impacts on the environment. This helps the bank create a good image with customers and society, thereby enhancing customer confidence and supporting revenue and profit growth.

Society: SeABank has policies and activities to socialize, towards the community and society. There are activities such as sponsoring social and educational programs.

In order to create motivation and facilitate this strategy, SeABank has implemented a number of activities such as consolidating the process of exploiting and managing chain customers. At the same time, SeABank also approached each specific Anchor to build suitable products for each specific chain as well as link SeABank’s financial services and products for a rich and diverse ecosystem, meeting different needs of stakeholders. The bank is also implementing the value chain with many different major partners, depending on risk appetite and implementation cooperation goals. These partners are not limited by the market.

In line with its international cooperation strategy with partners like the IFC, SeABank launched an incentive program in 2023 to promote green credit growth and help BUs focus on attracting customers with environmentally friendly business activities.