Banks and AI: Realizing business benefits

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Digital Reinvention
17/04/2025Study
Digital Reinvention
23Apr2025
23/04/2025Webinar

Banks and AI: Realizing Business Benefits

While proving ROI is still a challenge, many are seeing gains in efficiency, productivity, and decision-making. Instead of focusing solely on metrics, banks are prioritizing adoption and building internal AI capabilities.

People and culture have emerged as critical success factors—technology alone isn’t enough. Change management, re-skilling, and leadership buy-in are key. At the same time, banks are working to modernize data infrastructure, adopt cloud platforms, and strengthen governance to support safe and scalable AI use.

Data quality and accessibility remain significant obstacles, and many banks are still learning how to manage fragmented systems and rising expectations. Despite these hurdles, momentum is building—particularly around emerging areas like agentic AI, which is already reshaping customer service functions.

The report finds that while short-term wins are being realized, long-term success will depend on how well banks align AI with people, processes and trusted data foundations.

KEY INSIGHTS

AI Driving Business Value

Banks are moving from AI experimentation to practical deployment—improving efficiency, streamlining operations, enhancing decision-making, and boosting productivity. Generative AI is helping accelerate development cycles, optimize customer service, and support internal processes like compliance and coding.

Challenges to Overcome

Despite strong momentum, banks face persistent challenges: fragmented data, legacy systems, skills shortages, and the difficulty of measuring AI’s ROI. Many are still building the foundational infrastructure and governance needed to scale AI effectively across the organization.

Looking Ahead

To fully realize AI’s potential, banks must focus on people, not just platforms. Success depends on cultural transformation, data readiness, and change management. Emerging technologies like agentic AI show promise, but long-term value will come from aligning AI with business strategy and human expertise.

Download the full report

Study contributors

profile picture of Nacho Torre Solá

Nacho Torre Solá

Ibercaja - Caja de Ahorros y Monte de Piedad de Zaragoza, Aragón y Rioja

Director of Marketing and Digital Strategy

profile picture of Rafael Forte Araújo Cavalcanti

Rafael Forte Araújo Cavalcanti

Bradesco

Chief Data and Analytics Officer

profile picture of Rupert Rieder

Rupert Rieder

Erste Group

Strategic Project Lead

profile picture of Jitendra Tekchandani

Jitendra Tekchandani

DBS Bank Singapore

Executive Director, Wealth Management

profile picture of Zafar Kazmi

Zafar Kazmi

Emirates Islamic

Head of Digital Banking

profile picture of Garrett Woody

Garrett Woody

DLHBank Chicago

Enterprise Architect, Cloud & AI/ML, VP

profile picture of Daragh Morrissey

Daragh Morrissey

Microsoft

Director - Artificial Intelligence

profile picture of Patrik Rylander

Patrik Rylander

Swedbank

CTO

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