IBM Invests in Consumer Experience Labs

Responding to the results of recently conducted consumer and market research, IBM has opened three 'Banking Centers of Excellence' (BCOE) software labs, where it can test consumer opinion on banking application systems and CRM practices.

The research highlighted that US consumers don't feel valued by their banks, and advised that banks need to dispense with antiquated systems that don't share information across banking channels, and focus more on using loyalty and retention programmes to understand and improve the overall customer experience.

IBM has made a multimillion dollar investment in the new centers – in Silicon Valley, California; Poughkeepsie, New York; and Seoul, Korea – which can be accessed by clients and independent software vendors in person, or through a virtual online route.

The BCOE will use the results of this testing to help banks transform their older back-office processing systems by developing new operating models that take advantage of the most recent developments in IT.

'By integrating and renovating legacy software with service oriented architectures and performance boosting expertise, our labs can help clients get the most out of their IT investments and better meet the needs of their customers' said Steve Mills, Senior Vice President of IBM Software Group

The BCOEs are online at www-03.ibm.com/systems/z/feature022607 .

All articles 2006-23 written and edited by Mel Crowther and/or Nick Thomas, 2024- by Nick Thomas, unless otherwise stated.