After successful roles in both the Tourism and Mining industries in PNG and having grown up in the country, Nick Keane (founder and General Manager of Savi Moni) always knew he had unfinished there. He also recognised quite quickly that commercial lending in PNG presented a great opportunity to make a difference in an under-served market
It was late 2019, Nick had contacts in the market offering the possibility of seed capital and a partner to handle all the “technical stuff”.
The hunt which would eventually see Savi Moni enter the Axcess family began. Nick was to oversee things from a high-level but not get his hands too dirty. He’s not a techy! Nick was however technically savvy enough to recognise the importance of finding the right software to help grow and service his startup loan book. Nick needed affordable software that could grow as his business grew. He also needed to know help from real people was at hand. After an extensive search, followed by a short listing processing and plenty of calls, meetings and demonstrations, Savi Moni and Axcess Consulting joined forces.
Shortly afterward, two events conspired to change things for Nick and Savi Moni while still in an embryonic stage, and reinforce how pleased he was with the decision to implement Axcess.
An amicable parting of ways with the technical partner in the business, who was supposed to be the one “getting dirty hands” saw Nick thrust into the coal face just as the design decisions and configuration discussions were hitting full speed.
Nick continued to work with Axcess to finalise plans for the implementation, now scheduled for March – September 2020.
Next, as we all know, came Covid lockdowns, Work From Home orders and closed borders. This could’ve presented quite a roadblock for a start up entrepreneur, building a business in another country, and who didn’t really identify as a “techy”.
We now have a situation where configuration of a hosting solution and the Axcess software setup was occurring out of Geelong, Victoria, Nick was working out of his home office in Northern NSW, and a potential new partner, Bipin Agarwala had arrived on the seen, in Brisbane, Queensland, all working together to kick off a new business in Papua New Guinea. A “remote solution” to say the least.
At this point the flexibility and personal customer services of the Axcess solution, the attention to detail and personal touch kicked into over drive. Nick’s resolve to build the business as an online and remote service (that Covid restrictions would not impact) was only strengthened.
Weekly meetings, monthly sprints and deployments, testing and development continued, remotely for the coming months, all Covid safe.
By September, Savi Moni had customers logging in to submit loan applications from their web portal, and had disbursed 9 loans only days after “going live”. The tailored Axcess solution worked Savi’s way, using Savi’s terminology, Savi’s business rules, Savi’s workflows – completely tailored to their way of thinking. Axcess’ Streamlined processes, built strictly to their requirements was allowing one person (later two), to achieve the work of entire teams.
The customisable nature of ARMnet meant Nick could evolve his product offering, adapt arrears processing, alter processes to service his customers better than his opposition could and start writing new loans, from his spare room, with a partner in Brisbane, all in a different country.
Fast forward 18 months, Nick has written well over 600 loans, is engaging staff on the ground in PNG, and can finally visit his customers. Savi-Moni is steadily growing its customer base and is positioned for an exciting future supports by its AXCESS system.