Technical debt holds back AI transformation in banking
Technical debt is emerging as one of the biggest barriers to modernizing the financial sector.
According to Accenture, banks continue to devote most of their technology budgets to maintaining legacy systems, limiting their ability to fully capitalize on artificial intelligence.
Technical debt is becoming one of the primary obstacles preventing banks from realizing returns on their artificial intelligence investments. While financial institutions continue to accelerate the digitalization of their services, a significant share of their technology budgets remains tied to maintaining legacy systems, limiting innovation and increasing security risks.
A global analysis by Accenture found that financial institutions spend as much as 70% of their technology budgets maintaining existing systems, reducing their ability to modernize infrastructure and achieve a strong return on investment (ROI) from AI initiatives.
According to the study, the accumulation of technical debt also prevents organizations from fully harnessing AI’s potential. Rather than transforming core operations, many institutions are using the technology simply to accelerate traditional processes without fundamentally redesigning how they operate.
According to Juan Antonio García, Senior Client Account Executive at Accenture, the greatest challenge is not adopting new tools but redesigning the processes they support:
”The biggest mistake today is using artificial intelligence to automate processes that were already inefficient or confusing for users. The real return on investment comes not from accelerating existing work, but from rethinking decision flows, simplifying approvals and preparing employees to work alongside these new tools in their daily operations.”
Modernizing the technology core.
Colombia has emerged as one of Latin America’s leading markets for digital financial services, driven by millions of mobile transactions and the rapid growth of digital wallets.
However, this customer-facing progress often coexists with internal technology infrastructures that continue to rely on legacy platforms.
According to Colombia’s Financial Superintendency, the financial sector has increased investments in technology and cybersecurity to respond to the growing number of attacks targeting financial institutions.
However, Accenture argues that strengthening cybersecurity also requires transforming the core systems on which banks operate.
For García, cybersecurity must be embedded into the design of new platforms from the outset:
”In Colombia, cybersecurity can no longer be viewed as a compliance expense or simply a shield against attacks. With autonomous AI assistants expected to handle sensitive tasks such as fraud detection and customer service within the next three years, security must be built into technology architectures from the ground up. This is the only way to turn costly technical debt into digital capital that enables banks to innovate rapidly without increasing their operational vulnerability.”
Three changes to unlock value.
The study identifies three operational changes that are enabling some financial institutions to generate greater value from their AI investments:
1) Design around customer needs rather than service channels.
Instead of maintaining separate processes for branches, mobile apps, websites and call centers, AI enables institutions to build a unified customer journey that operates consistently across all channels, reducing errors, costs and operational complexity.
2) Move beyond task automation to redesign end-to-end processes.
The most successful AI initiatives use the technology to orchestrate complete workflows, connecting multiple functions and intelligent assistants that share information to resolve requests more quickly and efficiently.
3) Embed cybersecurity into software design.
Integrating security into core platforms helps reduce vulnerabilities, eliminate duplicate solutions and lower the technology complexity that drives operating costs.
Beyond AI adoption.
According to Accenture, the banking industry’s challenge is no longer simply adopting new technologies but transforming the underlying architecture on which institutions operate. The firm argues that only a comprehensive modernization of core systems will enable artificial intelligence to deliver sustainable improvements in efficiency, security and business growth.
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