The real meaning of success is to challenge obstacles and inhibitors, to re-rise after stumbles, to knock the door of success again and again and to bide your time with equanimity awaiting breakthroughs. This is the story of Thawani of Majid Al-A’mri; the story of entrepreneurship that defies definition and classification. If you have previously read the works of Mark Zuckerberg, you may as well peruse those of the Omani innovator to see how obstacles can be overcome. Passion represents a thoroughbred motive. If you lack both the passions of love and belief, you will be wasting your time futilely. The sublime goal here is sustainability of efforts; otherwise there will be only immediate objectives that come to an end as soon as interests have been fulfilled.
Thawani Fintech is a platform of Omani origin that has kicked off even before the Chinese contemplated the launching of WeChat in 2012 – a platform whose value is estimated at USD 60 billion according to a Harvard study (WeChat: A Global Platform?). It has thus exceeded the price of Whatsapp which was appropriated by Facebook with an amount of USD 19 billion. Planning and working with Thawani Fintech started simultaneously with the early beginnings of financial technology in the US Silicon Valley after the financial crisis in 2008.
Today, Thwani boasts over 11,000 subscribers while the volume of operations has reached 350,000 OR (approximately one million dollars). It employs over 18 Omani workers, thus posting a percentage of Omanization of 90%. Thawani performs payment transactions carried out by banks at a faster and safer pace. It has achieved that feat by availing three payment options for individuals or institutions: either through cash, credit cards or online. Small businesses are required to address banks for a period that may very well scale up to six months in order to fulfill the steps required for procuring the payment service online. This additionally means that the entrepreneur should possess a website that requires specialized programmers to link it to the Payment Gateway. All these steps can be accomplished in a matter of seconds on your mobile phone and you can access amounts from around the world without any banking complications.
There will not be need for an expiry date for the card nor will you be required to enter data every time. Large organization such as Oman Oil Marketing Company was able to integrate its financial unit with all gas stations by signing an agreement with Thawani, thus saving administrative and operational costs. You can fill your vehicle’s fuel tank with the car number only without entering any other data, which is likely to be stored in your phone’s memory. In brief, this will represent dispensing with redundant labor, saving substantial amounts of money and providing highly effective monitoring. Accounting operations, such as account reconciliation, are now a matter of the past while the steps of financial auditing have become more precise and more accurate. Hayya was the first among the government-owned enterprises to raise the efficiency of collecting payments by signing an agreement with Thawani. It managed within a matter of two months to build an integrated system that covers about 60 sites for discharging sewage residues following a time when payment operations were in cash and were hard to follow up. How much benefit can be derived under an advanced Omani digital payment system for raising the governmental spending and collection efficiently?
The Silicon Valley of the United States has not been planned but was rather brought into being when a group of factors made it a point of attraction for startup companies. The technological expert, Dr. Ali Al-Shidhani, points out that these factors include the presence of strong universities in the neighborhood such as Stanford University and the University of California Berkeley with which Oman University has signed a pact for establishment of an artificial intelligence training center. These universities taught computer science and computer engineering that laid the foundation for the presence of tech scholars. This was followed by establishment of tech companies that represent the second factor. That heralded the beginnings of the internet and research conducted on networks. The third factor is represented in daring entrepreneurs. The efforts of some countries that attempted to create a replica of the Silicon Valley failed because each of these countries has its own specific conditions and challenges and points of strength that it has to fall back on. Prevalence of favorable conditions would be sufficient for establishment of a Silicon Valley if efforts spring from the sublime goal of building an economy that is based on knowledge and that polarize international know-how in order to achieve sustainability of growth. How can we utilize the experience of Thwani in order to finalize the components of the Omani Silicon Valley? The creation of a stimulating environment for startup projects has its origins and basics of which financial support constitutes one step only.
The above components and factors were not available when Thawani kicked off. This is by all standards an inspiring story for entrepreneurs, startup companies and policy- and decision-makers. That Thawani managed to overcome legislative and financial obstacles under lack of digital infrastructure, programming competencies and communal and official awareness of Fintech represents a new lesson for meditation.
At its inception, Fintech Thawani required financing in excess of a quarter of a million Omani Rials for meeting the digital infrastructure expenses. Here, the presence of the Angel Investor represented a milestone for Thawani to see the light. The term ‘Angel Investor’ is not an emotional one but is rather applied to individual investment of a wealthy individual who possesses the daring to risk loss of his capital as a possible scenario.
Fintech projects require data centers, servers and firewalls that in turn require high monthly costs as compared to global costs of a highly competitive environment. Generally speaking, Fintech requires a digital infrastructure that is all set to embrace it similar to the one to be found at financial centers where local banks rely on their data centers, which calls for high operational cost of maintenance and supervision. Overcoming the latter obstacle would have saved 70% of the operational expenses. On the other hand, overcoming the soft or invisible infrastructure, represented in lack of efficient programmers out of university graduates, required establishment of the first version of Thawani outside the Sultanate of Oman as well as continuous training of new programmers under the supervision of Omani programmers of accumulated experience who are not attracted to work at startup companies. This means rising costs for prolonged consulting and staffing expenses so that Thwani may stand firmly on its feet to launch renewed versions that would raise the payments system to the global level.
As promised in my previous article, I would talk here about the success story of an Omani innovation despite the challenges. The presence of a sandbox would shorten the steps for legislators. Thawani had to overcome all the obstacles as well as meet all the complex legal and legislative commitments, requiring it to work diligently for five years. The hope remains that all obstacles will be overcome by issuance of the new national payment systems law that was issued in February 2018.
The Angelic Investor would not have been convincing if not for the sacrifice made by the Thawani founder who gave up his rewarding career, driven by his passion and his faith in his abilities which have been refined by the distinctive Schlumberger program. As of the first day, Schlumberger exposes graduates to the facts of real life, leaving them the choice of either passing the test or returning home. Following that, it would gradually saddle those graduates with responsibility in the field under direct supervision, leaving them scope for learning from their mistakes. This rigorous training program enables trainees to acquire multi-faceted experiences that enable them to manage full-fledged projects from operational, financial and administrative aspects. No training course can vest trainees with the sense of responsibility or the ability to cope with difficult circumstances. They can only acquire these at a professional work environment that refines them under the pressure of responsibilities.
The Angelic Investor realized with his unfailing enlightened awareness that the global economy is passing through a phase of critical change that creates unprecedented opportunities. He therefore departed from conventional investment of family business, harboring an unflinching belief in the abilities of Omani youth. Will Thawani be the first startup Omani Unicorn Company whose value exceeds a billion dollars?
The founder of Thawani is one of the promising and innovative Omani youth who is entitled to be awarded the Omani Technology Order.