DTB to open 11 new branches in East Africa

By JAMES ANYANZWA

Diamond Trust Bank (DTB) Group will spend Sh275 million on new branches this year.

The bank expects to use a wide branch network to grow its market share in the small and retail banking business, which has attracted many competitors including Kenya Commercial Bank, Equity Bank, Cooperative Bank and CFC Stanbic Bank.

DTB is scheduled to open 11 additional branches in four of the five East African Community member states in the next four months.

This will push the bank’s regional branch network to 68 from 57.

The lion’s share of the new branches will be in Kenya.

The new branches will be distributed as: Kenya (five), Uganda (three), Tanzania (two) and Burundi (one).

The bank’s branches in Kenya will climb to 35 from 30.

"Our principal target market are the Small and Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) and individuals and we hope to entrench our position in them," said Ms Nasim Devji, DTB’s Group Chief Executive.

"There has been huge investment in branches. The idea is to reach out to this group of people and provide them with financial services and products," she said.

According to DTB, by being closer to its consumers, the management gets insights needed to provide various products that reflect customer needs. Devji, however, did not rule out the use of agency banking model saying a combination of the two (branch and agency banking models) will work out well for the bank.

New model

"We have engaged several agencies but we are looking at the technology part of it as well," Devji told reporters at the bank’s offices in Nairobi last week.

DTB expects to finance its branch expansion programme using part of the proceeds of the previous rights issues, including lines of credit from the bank’s equity partner.

In 2006 and 2007, DTB Kenya raised Sh2.4 billion ($30 million) through two successive rights issue and in 2008 the bank received a Sh2 billion ($25 million) from the International Finance Corporation in the form of long-term line of credit.

"We need to add value and capture the market share of the SME’s market," said Alkarim Jiwa, the bank’s general manager in- charge of finance and planning

The operationalisation of the Finance Act 2009 this year amended the Banking Act allowing banks to use third party agents.