2014 may be the year that banks pick up the pace in their walk-crawl-run to new operational models. The reason for urgency is threefold: to find ways to improve profitability and return on equity; to meet customer expectations of personalization and better service; and to digitize to stay alive. Expect to see reconfigured business models and renewed Read More
Faced by competitive challenges from non-bank disruptors such as PayPal, Google and Apple, banks are stepping up their efforts to be more innovative. Many have established innovation teams, for example. A recent Accenture study pointed out, however, that in spite of funding and executive endorsements, many banks are still not satisfied with their innovation programs’ ability to Read More
For the 12 institutions named as finalists in the 2013 BAI-Finacle Global Banking Innovation Awards, innovation means expanding the boundaries of traditional products and services in retail banking to improve the customer experience. Below are short profiles of the finalists; the winners, as determined by a distinguished panel of judges, will be announced November 5 at BAI Retail Read More
With the global financial crisis of 2008-2009 mostly in the rear view mirror, banks around the globe can focus more on the future, which means improving the customer experience through innovation, particularly in the delivery of mobile services. That’s the view of a panel of bankers and financial services executives assembled to judge the 2013 BAI-Finacle Global Read More
In many industries, great customer service is all about facilitating pleasant, memorable interactions between customers and company employees. The banking industry, however, has recognized a paradoxical truth about customers: in certain contexts, the best customer service means giving customers the flexibility to serve themselves. Over the last century, retail banks have developed a range of innovative technologies Read More
Innovation requires focus and a disciplined process. That’s the message from the winners of the 2012 BAI-Finacle Global Banking Innovation Awards, which were awarded at BAI Retail Delivery 2012 on October 9 in Washington, D.C. Each of the institutions that won in the four categories consciously focused on innovation as a way to differentiate themselves from competitors Read More
The frustration of small business owners with U.S. banks is well known. Despite political pressure on banks to loosen the purse strings, pent-up demand for loans continues to build following the imposition of restricted credit standards in the wake of the 2008-2009 financial crisis. In the second quarter of 2012, only 33% of all small and medium size enterprises Read More
For the eight finalists of the 2012 BAI-Finacle Global Banking Innovation Awards, innovation means breaking outside of banking’s traditional product, services and channel categories and sometimes even pioneering game-changing or “disruptive” technologies. Below are short profiles of the finalists. The final winners, as determined by a distinguished panel of judges will be announced October 9 at BAI Read More
If you left for work without your wallet, you’d turn around and go back for it. Same with your mobile. No matter how simple your phone is, being without it puts you at a loss. That’s why the concept of the mobile wallet is so compelling and why, if banks can satisfy lingering concerns about security, consumers Read More
The payments news these days are filled with new developments on the mobile wallet front, from companies such as Isis, Google and even Wal-Mart, for example. Despite these early entrants, our recent mobile wallet study shows that the mobile wallet market remains up for grabs – which is good news for banks. In our online survey of Read More
The death of Apple Inc. founder and CEO Steve Jobs reminded us all of how one individual can have a huge impact on a particular company – and on the national and global economy as well. Unquestionably, Steve Jobs and his impact were unique but some lessons from the Apple experience can be distilled and made applicable Read More
The advent of mobile and online banking, so-called “alternative” payment applications and the rapid increase of nonbanks in the retail payments environment have clearly revolutionized the payments system but those changes have raised a key question: Does the rapid disaggregation of the payments value chain have to spell gloom and doom from a fraud-and-security perspective? Or, to Read More
Banking is a cyclical industry and right now appears to be heading into another period of difficulty with the financial crisis in Europe and controversies over derivatives trading and the so-called “Liborgate” scandal. An opportune time for bankers to duck into their shells, perhaps? On the contrary, bankers around the world are continuing their efforts to innovate Read More
Surely your most critical strategic initiatives are entirely under your control, right? Think again. You will find that some of the most important ones are entrusted to others – to vendors. Whether it’s creating new revenue streams, reducing costs or improving customer experience, in many cases you are trusting that a vendor you hired will deliver the Read More
Concepts that start out simply rarely end that way, which you can see in the evolution of terminology. Take the relatively common practice of contracting with another party to provide goods or services. What began as “contract services” has morphed over time into: outsourcing, supply chain management, logistics, third-part service providers, supplier risk management, vendor performance management Read More
Financial services firms possess the data to make sound decisions – whether to underwrite a loan, extend an offer to retain a customer or reduce exposure in a certain market. The problem is that the data deluge is so overwhelming that being able to make sound decisions quickly is not easy. Analytical run times either grow too Read More
One theme that appears consistently on agendas at banking industry conferences is the need for innovation to drive revenue and profitability growth. Yet, most of the pioneers in financial services have been non-bank companies as banks hunkered down into survival mode after the 2008-2009 financial crisis. Now that the industry has stabilized, innovation is needed more than Read More
Organic growth in banking revenue and profit has been extremely challenging lately. Historically, such growth has come as clients’ product needs increased, new clients were added in growing regions and innovation created new markets. Yet, from 2008 to 2010, consumer lending and cards, deposit products and mortgage balances all fell, as a proportion of U.S. household balance Read More
It’s become conventional wisdom in the banking industry to say that the “branch of the future” must evolve from a place where customers primarily conduct transactions to one in which they can seek advice, guidance and professional service on all things financial. That, however, is easier said than done. Our surveys and those of others consistently show Read More
The cloud. It seems like everyone from technology pundits to mothers in TV commercials is talking about how computing is moving to the cloud – the delivery of applications to distributed users from a central location rather than putting software on individual PCs or local servers. And there’s fire behind the smoke. Gartner estimates that worldwide cloud Read More
