First Bank taps Backbase for engagement banking platform
First Bank, a full-service bank based in St. Louis, US, has gone live with the Backbase Engagement Banking platform to cultivate “a seamless, digital-first experience” for its customers.
Founded in 1910, the family-owned bank provides commercial, retail and business banking services across the states of Missouri, California and Illinois, while also offering mortgage services in Kansas.
It is now leveraging its partnership with Backbase, a Dutch provider of front-end digital banking solutions, to unify its services through its Engagement Banking platform, citing its centralised nature as a cause for its selection.
Bala Nibhanupudi, EVP and chief technology and operations officer at First Bank, describes the partnership as “the final step in our years-long digital transformation journey”, which has seen the restructuring of its physical infrastructure, banking core, middleware and CRM.
The platform is set to enable the bank to integrate multiple existing technology solutions into its own services, including the 13 solutions already paired with the platform for cybersecurity and payments, as well as allowing access to Backbase’s managed hosting services.
At the customer level, the bank’s adoption of platform means they will be able to engage with its services by exclusively digital means, while this interaction will no longer be limited to areas where it retains a physical presence.
Sam Boggs, executive VP for Backbase mid-market, says the solutions provider is focused on providing clients with digital banking capabilities that “go beyond their legacy systems and point solutions” that ultimately help them deliver new products at speed.
First Bank joins the likes of Romanian bank BRD, Vietnam’s Orient Commercial Joint Stock Bank (OCB) and Judo Bank in Australia among the financial institutions to tap Backbase solutions this year.