BIAN launches inaugural North American Chapter meeting

2015/08/24
by Hans Tesselaar, Executive Director of BIAN
Publication: Finextra


The Banking Industry Architecture Network (BIAN) prides itself on being a global organisation — with members spanning every continent. Particularly, in recent years we have seen a noticeable uptake in interest from banks and service providers in the US. With banks in this region typically perceived as closed to the idea of collaborating and sharing ideas with their competitors, it’s encouraging to see that there has been a clear attitude shift amongst these players.

Faced with challenges including juggling the unconsolidated web of financial regulatory bodies across the US, and the increased competition from FinTech alternatives, banks in the region are realising that working together can be far more successful than trying to battle the changing landscape alone.

With this in mind BIAN, along with First Niagara Bank, is hosting its inaugural North American Chapter meeting in First Niagara’s Buffalo New York office on September 16th to 17th. The conference will provide banks from across the region with a secure platform from which to exchange their views on navigating the industry challenges and developing solutions to keep up with the pace of digital transformation in the sector.

Against the backdrop of increased competition and a growing regulatory burden, many US banks are facing increased pressure, thanks to their antiquated banking IT infrastructure, which was developed in a pre-internet era. The North American Chapter will include a training session and discussion group, whereby US banks will be invited to learn more about BIAN’s globally standardised core banking framework — which seeks to overcome this issue on an international scale. Members including First Niagara, PNC Bank, CIBC, IBM and FIS Global will discuss how they have worked together with banks, IT experts and academic bodies from across the globe to build an IT framework that works across the industry. These organisations recognise that fundamental banking technology should not be a competition point. The re-use and selective use of third-party services, including cloud, enabled by industry service-level standards, will increase bank agility, eventually moving BIAN standards from a competitive differentiator to a competitive requirement.

Word is spreading across the financial industry of the benefit of combining expertise to overcome core challenges in the sector. Just this month, BIAN was recognised in Gartner’s report ‘Transformational Disruptions in Banking by 2025’, as one of eight key transformational disruptions for digital banking innovation that will have a major impact on the sector in the next five to seven years.