New Delhi: Public sector banks will roll out a global capability centre (GCC) strategy in FY27 and prepare a capacity-building roadmap. State Bank of India (SBI), which set up the first GCC among state-run lenders earlier this year, will take the lead, said people familiar with the developments. Banks are also expected to assess active-active data centre models for inclusion in their five-year business plans.
“Some of these initiatives will be pursued as part of the latest reforms agenda. Banks will also look at combining strengths to offer complete banking solutions, including blockchain technology, advanced risk assessment and fraud detection models,” said a bank executive. Under the EASE 9.0 reforms agenda, lenders will also develop core AI stacks, including LLM licensing, GPU strategies and private cloud model deployment. In January, SBI said its GCC will serve as a single point of contact, offering end-to-end banking solutions to GCCs operating in Karnataka. The Enhanced Access and Service Excellence (EASE) reforms-steered by the Department of Financial Services (DFS)-are designed to modernise state-run lenders through governance, technology and risk-management upgrades.
“Some of these initiatives were also discussed during PSB Manthan held last year. The idea is to prepare PSBs to leverage technology and improve productivity and scale through new business models,” said another bank executive. Under Ease 9.0 PSBs will further build up enterprise-wide consent management capabilities, and at-scale data tokenisation and anonymisation to enable continuity of banks usage of data for business or strategic purposes.
According to a report by Quess Corp, India’s banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) GCCs are projected to grow to $125 billion by 2032. The report notes that 185-190 BFSI GCCs operate across India, employing approximately 540,000 professionals and representing 25% of all GCC employees in the country.
