Significant changes are affecting the retail banking industry in the last few years. The risk of disintermediation coming from the rise of new models such as Financial Social Networks or direct banking players, changes in the regulatory framework about payments (i.e. SEPA) and the deployment of new Information and Communication Technologies are generating a profound transformation in retail bank business and operational models. Beyond this, the recent financial turmoil has increased the pressure on retail banks’ goal of improving both their reputation and their operational efficiency. In this environment, banks are redesigning their frontoffice organizations to achieve full integration of three key channels: the Internet, the telephone and the physical branch. More specifically, banks are designing their Internet banking platforms in order to allow customers to not only perform all transactional services (i.e. managing an account, transferring money, trading securities, controlling returns on investments), but even more complicated services (i.e. underwriting a mortgage or a credit card). Branches will not disappear, but their role will change significantly: the physical branch will be still the last line of contact for customers and the location to organize the sale of more complicated (and profitable) products. In the same way, customers’ trust will mainly be built inside the branch. In a similar way, banks will try to discourage the use of cash (whose logistics is complex and expensive) and will foster the use of electronic payments. This will have considerable implications for backoffice operations and the availability of data about customers that banks can use to understand their customers’ financial habits.
Principal Academic Tutor
Paolo Neirotti
Production Systems and Business Economics, Politecnico di Torino
Academic Tutors
Marco Vaudetti
Architectural and Industrial Design, Politecnico di Torino
External institution
ISMB – Istituto Superiore Mario
Boella, e-Security Lab
External Tutor
Daniele Mazzocchi
ISMB – Istituto Superiore Mario Boella,
e-Security Lab
Team members
TEAM A
Marco Fiorini [Team controller],Management, Economics and Industrial
Engineering
Emanuele Chirico, Industrial Engineering and Management
Ilaria Cillo, Engineering for Cinema and Methods of Communications
Valentina Colombo, Architecture
Manuela Monti [Project Communication Coordinator], Management, Economics and Industrial Engineering
TEAM B
Matteo Ainardi [Team controller], Computer Engineering
Tiziano Barbagallo, Industrial Engineering and Management
Jonathan D’Elia, Environmentally friendly product Design
Arianna Luna, Management, Economics and Industrial Engineering
Gabriella Negro, Industrial Engineering and Management