A leading digital transformation company Publicis Sapient is sharing the key findings from its latest Global Banking Benchmark Study, part of an ongoing programme of research, insights and thought leadership on the latest digital transformation trends in Financial Services.
The global survey incorporates the views of over 1,000 senior Retail and Commercial banking executives around the world including Thailand as well as Southeast Asia (SEA) and assesses the extent to which organisations are making progress in areas critical to digital innovation in a post COVID-19 world as they embark on the next frontier of digital transformation. In addition, interviews with senior leaders were conducted on how leading financial institutions are progressing on their journey to a digital-first future.
This year's study reveals that banks are aggressively gearing up for the next phase of digital transformation. After making only moderate progress over the past 12 months, banks are refocusing on operational agility by investing in new technologies and enhancing their data use. And although banks have bold ambitions for digital transformation, the survey finds many hurdles, including regulatory obstacles, and legacy technologies.
Key takeaways:
- SEA banks have more work to do in driving digital transformation strategy: COVID-19, legacy technology, and a lack of operational agility were the greatest barriers to digital transformation during the past 12 months. For the largest banks, legacy technology is the key area to address. However, COVID-19's significance as an impediment to progress seems to be waning.
- Last year, 43%of bank leaders in SEA identified COVID-19 as a significant roadblock; 43% also remarked that regulatory challenges were also a top barrier to digital business transformation in SEA.
- 37% respondents working in SEA banks believe that legacy technology is hindering their digital business transformation, although 72% believe they are well on their way to improving their technology as a priority.
- One-third (34%)of respondents report a lack of agile operating models in SEA Banks whereas, 40% of bank leaders in Thailand are yet to make significant progress implementing these plans
- Thailand also recorded 'lack of technology expertise at board level' '(34%) and 'failure of past digital investments' (27%) as the top barriers to digital transformation
- A top priority is improving the customer experience: A quarter (24%) SEA respondents said their organizations are prioritizing improving the customer experience as their main digital transformation goal. Similarly in Thailand, 20% bank leaders agreed that their organization should prioritize improving customer experience to become digital innovative bank
- 33% of the bank leaders in Thailand are seeking revenue growth from new innovative products and services.
- 53% bank leaders in Thailand want to combine customer data across different systems to better understand and engage with their customers.
- SEA banks are investing more in intelligent technology, analytics, and cloud:
- Four out of ten banks operation transformation priorities are to invest in intelligent technologies, while one in four agree that this investment will enable banks to deliver at speed over the next few years.
- 38% of bank leaders in SEA and 27% of bank leaders in Thailand are looking to data and analytics to obtain a richer understanding of their customers; half of banks cite data measurement and analytics as one of their top three traits to be a digitally innovative bank
- 54% bank leaders in Thailand cite adaptive, cloud-based architecture as another critical element for a bank to be digitally innovative.
- ESG strategy that gives SEA Bank competitive edge:
- 87% bank leaders in Thailand acknowledged that their organization do provide guidance on how ESG risks should be assessed with respect to investments / financing
Emma Scales, Managing Director of Publicis Sapient commented, "We foresee banks in Thailand as well as across Southeast Asia will continue to invest in more intelligent tech to help deliver richer more meaningful insights of their customers. This investment is needed to thrive in a more customer-centric world, alongside developing modern cloud-based banking systems to increase their accessibility to deliver transformative products and services at speed to customers over the next three years."