APAC banks increase technology investments

By EgovAsia Editors | Jan 20, 2010

Banks in the Asia/Pacific region are expected to increase their technology investments in 2010, according to the latest annual report by IDC Financial Insights. Many of the transformative and long-term projects that were held off because of uncertain economic conditions last year are expected to be revisited and implemented this year. Progress in these projects will change the IT planning and IT governance practices of banks. More insights are revealed in the report, “Top Ten Strategic IT Initiatives for Asia/Pacific Banks in 2010: Investing for The Comeback" which discusses the top 10 strategic IT initiatives for banks in the Asia/Pacific region for 2010.

The top four initiatives for 2010 identified by IDC Financial Insights Asia/Pacific include risk management; customer centricity and channels; data management and business analytics; and, IT governance. The report also discusses how top IT priorities of banks are affected by the technology providers that serve the banking industry.

"Strategic IT priorities will shift toward solutions that enable banks to quickly fill in gaps in their risks management capabilities, as well as take on risk management best practices learned from the recent crisis. Focus will also be given to newly revamped programs for customer acquisition, cross-sell and up-sell, and customer loyalty as banks build business from their post-crisis customer databases," states Michael Araneta, Senior Consulting and Research Manager, IDC Financial Insights Asia/Pacific.

Li-May Chew, CFA, Senior Research Manager, Financial Insights Asia/Pacific adds, "The need to roll out a good IT governance program will become more crucial. IT teams should make sense of disparate projects competing for attention. They need to be able to associate these projects with strategic objectives on operational efficiency, risk management, and customer centricity, all underpinned by the still-important cost management agenda."