The banking industry in Asia-Pacific will continue to evolve in 2025. Financial institutions face growing pressures from multiple directions: economic uncertainty, increased competition, expanding compliance requirements, and mounting internal operational demands. These challenges come alongside rising customer expectations for better services delivered faster and at lower cost than before. Internally, banks must modernize legacy systems, streamline processes, and upskill workforces while simultaneously pursuing product innovation and margin improvement.
Key findings from the research include:
- The operating environment remains challenging. Across the region, 56% of banks believe it is more challenging to win and retain customers than it was 12 months ago.
- Product development is high on the agenda. In total, 49% of banks in Asia-Pacific report that investing to deliver enhanced products or services is one of the three most important drivers of their technology strategy.
- In response, growth in technology budgets is increasing. The executives surveyed in Celent’s Dimensions study indicated that IT spending will grow by 6.1% on average this year. However, given the potential for economic disruption caused by the tariff policy of the US government, it is not yet clear if budget growth will occur at that level.
- Digital account opening emerged as the leading product priority for 2025, with 44% of banks across the region identifying it as their top focus area. Close behind are investments in digital channels, payments and card innovations, and comprehensive modernization of lending and financing platforms
- Underpinning this will be further investments in AI technologies. This is the single biggest area of technology investment for 33% of banks in Asia-Pacific and will support a range of use cases across the front, middle, and back-office. GenAI will continue to be an important element of the broader push towards greater use of data across organizations, and 69% of banks plan to launch customer-facing services using the technology in 2025.
