2022 will be a year of innovation for banks in North America. With the impact of the pandemic now largely behind us and today’s customer expectations now clear, the focus of the industry is squarely on delivering growth.
This is reflected in a clear emphasis on IT investment. Across the industry financial institutions of all sizes report strongly expanding technology budgets, and many have clear plans to apply these to a range of enhancements to their products, experiences, and operations. Across North America, retail banks report that their IT budgets are growing by 4.8% on average compared to 2021. The expectation is that budgets will increase by an even larger amount in 2023, reflecting a growing appetite for technology-enabled growth as the industry accelerates away from the pandemic.
To shed new light on the strategic and product-level technology priorities of the industry, Celent has launched its Banking IT Strategy Survey (CBISS). Through detailed conversations with close to 200 banks we have gathered granular insights on the leading technology priorities for the year ahead, as well as the products and processes that will see the greatest change.
This report provides detailed perspectives on the investment and strategic imperatives of banks in North America.
Key findings include:
- 65% of banks believe that it is more challenging to win and retain business than a year ago
- 55% cite migrating workloads to public cloud infrastructure as a technology priority for 2022
- 53% are focusing on investing in data management, including 55% of those in the US
- 63% of banks are investing in the digital lending experience, making it the single biggest product priority
- 63% report that their institution has a clear strategy to engage with the open ecosystem
The lessons for the industry are clear. Funding innovation is a major strategic driver for banks in North America. Banks that don’t invest risk falling behind the market.
