SAF Update: Banking in Transformation

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The two sessions that I lead on Banking Transformation in a SaaS and Composite Application World went very well. Similarly to the last post that I submitted many of the banking folks agreed with the challenges with SaaS in this highly regulated industry. However, if you look at Banking in particular, SaaS is not new. They have been using services for some time now. Think about

  • Payments is the classic example as a service exposed by banks.
  • Online Banking services to customers instead of tellers and ATM's
  • Commercial Services to auto leasing dealerships as an example
  • Correspondent Banking services to community or smaller savings and loans (S&L) banks
  • Usage of Third Party Services such as Credit Checks, Insurance Checks, etc.

All these are examples of SaaS in banking. However the latest and greatest technology was not employed would be the biggest difference between these legacy systems and the more contemporary.

Feedback from banks in the is session provided some interesting insight. Here are the highlights:

  • The mainframe is still here and isn't going anywhere for some time
    • However, interoperability is a key concern. Exposure of services on the mainframe is at up most importance
  • A lot of talk around standards and the lack of leadership in the industry standards
  • Justification, education and enterprise architecture (EA) is still maturing
  • EA tools are not mature enough yet
  • Meta-Data is key
  • SaaS is on the minds of Banks and there are practical implementations that can be explored.