KYA – Know your Asset – a new standard on the e-leasing market

Leasing is around us since ages. It has started from the idea to exchange the goods. Modern concept of leasing appeared in XIX century when goods started to be rented for a certain price with obligation to return them back. Nowadays, we all talk about eLeasing, which still has the same principles, but it comes with digitalization and new technology. In all the cases, leasing is part of global economy and is a tool which helps millions of individuals and companies to finance their businesses on a daily basis.

Some personal insights

The same way as leasing became part of the global economy, it became part of me when I joined ITDS back in 2017 year. I had a chance to work for big players worldwide, met smart people, completed several complex projects and the main point here is that I gained experience. Experience not just about leasing products and how they work in certain countries, but also team work in multicultural environment, automatization of business processes, clients expectations and enriching my soft skills.

Read more about ITDS new strategy: ITDS strategy for 2022

KYC -> KYA

Having all this background, I discovered one interesting gap in leasing concept. Leasing companies or dealers tend to look into customer direction only, focusing on KYC (Know You Customer), pricing, underwriting and products. Nothing bad with this approach, however, to have the full puzzle completed they also have to know their asset.

With my ITDS colleagues Riadh Chaabouni, Charles Gamba, Paulo Bras and Bartosz Leszczynski we thoroughly discussed this topic and came up with the conclusion that we need to share this message with the public. This is how KYA “Know Your Asset” concept appeared, which was presented on eLeasing Day 4.0 conference in Warsaw, 10th of May 2022 organized by Związek Polskiego Leasingu (ZPL).

Get conscious of our values

The idea was to convince leasing companies and dealers to know their assets better with help of IoT “Internet of Things” technology. In fact, asset is a good or item which is having some value. The rule is simple: the longer it keeps its value the longer it can be used by the business. Knowing your asset can bring many benefits like increasing asset lifecycle, reducing risk exposure and applying fair pricing. With extended asset lifecycle, live market price, right usage by customer, location and status of the asset your business can save a lot of money on reutilizing or simply you know the best moment when to sell it. We should also care more about our planet, about the future and our kids. By giving second life to our assets, we can achieve all this. That is why KYA has to become a new leasing standard.

New standard_New challenges

However, a new standard always brings new challenges. First of all, more information about assets should be collected now like GPS location, status, mileage, CO2 emissions, damage or overuse signs, but with IoT it should be not a problem. Second, new KYA regulations should come into place, the same way how KYC or GDPR appeared. Third and probably one of the important challenges is to change customer behavior towards leased asset. This goes in parallel with new reusability mindset of all affected parties of the asset. Finally, business tools have to be ready to support KYA.

The world is changing fast and leasing concept is developing with it. I strongly believe that KYA is part of this change to make leasing even better.