PSU Banking 2.0: Merge & Surge

In the second in a series of web panel discussions organized by Banking Frontiers on the themes of amalgamation and lockdown, senior executives of public sector banks share new insights.

- Manoj Agrawal

We are engaged but not yet married’ is how Pravin Sharma, General Manager - IT, Union Bank of India, described the status of the 3-way merger of the bank with Andhra Bank and Corporation Bank, adding there has to be a lot of preparations to me made for the integration of the IT departments of the 3 banks. “We have achieved a lot in terms of HR, regional offices, administration offices, field general offices and reorganization of corporate verticals. However, currently IT is in discussion stage on how it can be taken forward. Studies have been going on and service providers have been onboarded about migrating the core. Core is only one piece of IT. Channels are much more important and risk also arises there, including customer issues. We have gone through each application in terms of customer and IT perspectives and finalized what functions will be there in the merged entity. It may take some time,” he says.

Reiterating that amalgamation from IT perspective is key, Sharma said existing systems and services have to remain and in parallel, one has to do reorganization of products. Besides, core banking migration is a big task and UAT will change the game.

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