Santander, under the leadership of its group chief executive Jose Antonio Álvarez, was the first international bank to really focus on the small and medium-sized enterprise segment across the markets in which it operates.
In Brazil its impressive growth in recent years was, in large part, due to the success of Getnet, its collection and services platform. The bank used Getnet payments processing machines as a route to gain SME business accounts and the personal accounts of entrepreneurs and their employees. Santander launched Getnet in Chile and Argentina in 2020 (having already launched in Mexico) and it is now also having a similarly positive impact on Santander’s SME and wider business in these markets.
The bank empowers its local teams to be autonomous when addressing the SME segment.
For example, in Argentina it developed and implemented a new sales channel in 2020 that enabled 100% remote management.