Transforming data into action for a leading UK retail  bank

Data is the key to understanding customers, managing risk and driving growth in today’s ultra-competitive retail banking landscape. A leading UK bank needed to establish a new, independent data foundation to enable it to separate from its parent organisation and operate as a standalone bank. Uniting its disparate data sources, facilitating advanced analytics and delivering actionable insights required a modern data platform—and a modern data partner.
 

The bank faced several challenges with existing legacy systems. Data was fragmented across multiple silos, making it difficult to access and analyse, while traditional data warehousing approaches were too rigid and slow to keep up with the bank’s evolving business. The bank also lacked a unified advanced analytics and machine learning platform, which would be crucial to stay one step ahead of the competition. 

The bank’s envisioned a centralised data lake platform that could ingest and process vast amounts of structured, semi-structured and unstructured data in real-time. The platform would provide a foundation for the bank’s teams to develop models to drive enterprise sales, create bespoke marketing campaigns, examine customer engagement and deliver on its risk management objectives.
 

The bank partnered with Version 1 to design and implement a data lake solution. We conducted workshops to understand the bank’s business objectives, data requirements and operational processes. Then, we analysed its existing data landscape, identifying key sources and mapping flows.
 

Working closely with stakeholders across the bank, we translated business requirements into technical specifications to define target data structures within the data lake and fostered a deep understanding of the bank’s data assets through regular communication throughout the project. We also implemented a robust data ingestion pipeline and developed a suite of business intelligence dashboards to provide stakeholders with intuitive visualisations and reports. This data literacy has empowered users to make data-driven decisions, which in turn has fuelled innovation and supercharged the bank’s growth.
 

The data lake programme delivered tangible results for the bank. By integrating historical data with new interfaces, the firm was able to create a seamless view of its entire product portfolio and customer base. The result? Improved operational efficiency and enhanced customer experience.
 

Outcomes

• Conducted workshops to identify key data sources, requirements, and operational processes 
• Analysed existing data landscape and mapped data flows 
• Translated business requirements into technical specifications and defined target data structures 
• Implemented a robust data ingestion pipeline and developed business intelligence dashboards 
• Fostered data literacy among stakeholders through transparent communication and collaboration 

The team from Version 1 has been first-class in their attitude, application, and interaction with challenging business stakeholders. The team showed real appetite to take ownership of their deliverables and get the right outcomes for both the programme and the end user community. 

– Programme Manager, Client Feedback