Punjab National Bank Dramatically Improves ... - HCL Infosystems
Punjab National Bank Dramatically Improves ... - HCL Infosystems
Punjab National Bank Dramatically Improves ... - HCL Infosystems
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Microsoft Windows Server System<br />
Customer Solution Case Study<br />
<strong>Punjab</strong> <strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong> <strong>Dramatically</strong> <strong>Improves</strong><br />
Rural <strong>Bank</strong>ing in India<br />
Overview<br />
Country or Region: India<br />
Industry: <strong>Bank</strong>ing<br />
Customer Profile<br />
<strong>Punjab</strong> <strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong> (PNB) is one of the<br />
leading public sector banks in India. It has<br />
a large retail-banking network of over<br />
4,400 branches and service counters that<br />
spreads out into far-flung and remote<br />
areas.<br />
Business Situation<br />
PNB was faced with the prospect of<br />
increased competition from new private<br />
and international banks. It also faced the<br />
challenge of linking all of its branch<br />
operations into a cohesive entity to serve<br />
its customers. The bank's operations serve<br />
a widespread population that speaks many<br />
different languages.<br />
Solution<br />
PNB chose BancMate from Natural<br />
Technologies to run its branch banking<br />
operations on Microsoft® Windows<br />
Server 2003 and Microsoft SQL Server<br />
2000.<br />
Benefits<br />
Bilingual software improves customer<br />
relationships.<br />
Easy to implement and troubleshoot.<br />
User friendly, cuts training time.<br />
Scalable from very small to large.<br />
“The Windows Server 2003–based solution was easy<br />
to implement as well as maintain remotely across our<br />
network of far-flung rural branches.”<br />
K. S. Bajwa, General Manager–IT, <strong>Punjab</strong> <strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong><br />
<strong>Punjab</strong> <strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong> (PNB) is one of the 500 largest banks in the<br />
world, and enjoys a rich history and heritage. PNB was the first<br />
Indian bank to be started solely with Indian capital. Established in<br />
1895 at Lahore, and nationalized in 1969, it has worked<br />
assiduously to build the banking sector in rural and urban India. It<br />
has presence in remote areas of the country, cutting across cultural<br />
and linguistic boundaries. Computerization of the branches for data<br />
accuracy, operational ease, facilitation of customer interaction with<br />
banking products, and centralization of data was of concern for<br />
remote branches. One of the important reasons for choosing<br />
BancMate—a multilingual Total Branch Automation (TBA) package<br />
for rural and semi-urban branches—was that it is based on<br />
Microsoft® Windows Server System, which provides ease of<br />
learning and intuitiveness, as well as the ability to easily implement<br />
and support solutions based on it.
“We chose BancMate as<br />
our rural banking<br />
solution because it is a<br />
robust solution.<br />
Together with the Windows<br />
operating Server 2003 system and SQL<br />
and<br />
database, Server 2000, it has it has<br />
never<br />
given never us given any us trouble. any<br />
In<br />
trouble. addition, In new addition, IT staff new<br />
members IT staff members also find also<br />
it<br />
easy find it to easy adapt to adapt to the to<br />
the solution.” solution.”<br />
K. S. Bajwa, General Manager - IT, <strong>Punjab</strong><br />
<strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong><br />
“We have been able to<br />
deploy the BancMate<br />
solution at over 2,300<br />
branches in India over<br />
the last two years, which<br />
is a unique<br />
achievement.”<br />
K. S. Bajwa, General Manager–IT, <strong>Punjab</strong><br />
<strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong><br />
Situation<br />
The <strong>Punjab</strong> <strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong> (PNB) enjoys a<br />
long and rich history; established in 1895, in<br />
Lahore, in the then undivided India, it was the<br />
first bank to be started solely with Indian<br />
capital. Subsequent to the partition of the<br />
country, PNB was popularly known as an<br />
Indian <strong>Bank</strong>. As part of the nationalization of<br />
banks that happened in 1969, PNB was also<br />
nationalized.<br />
Today, PNB operates 4,070 branches and<br />
443 service counters across the country,<br />
consolidating its position as one of the top<br />
nationalized banks of India. PNB has been<br />
ranked at 395 th position amongst the top<br />
1000 global banks by the prestigious<br />
international publication The <strong>Bank</strong>er.<br />
Like other scheduled banks in India, the PNB<br />
also comes under the guidance of the<br />
Reserve <strong>Bank</strong> of India (RBI) and as a<br />
government establishment, it has to follow<br />
directions of the government. Two directives,<br />
one from the Reserve <strong>Bank</strong> of India and the<br />
other from India's Department of Official<br />
languages are key in this context. In 1985,<br />
the Department of Official Languages<br />
mandated that all electronic equipment used<br />
in ministries and departments of the<br />
government and their attached and<br />
subordinate offices would need to be<br />
bilingual. That is, they should be able to<br />
handle both Hindi and English. By the year<br />
2000, the Reserve <strong>Bank</strong> of India had<br />
mandated that banks should have a clear IT<br />
plan that should be implemented: that at<br />
least 70 percent of all branches should be<br />
computerized.<br />
At this time, PNB was perhaps the least<br />
computerized bank in the country. Not only<br />
that, almost the entire IT team was new.<br />
From that time onwards, PNB has come a<br />
long way, winning laurels for its innovative<br />
approach to IT implementation. It started out<br />
by first purchasing over 4,000 standalone<br />
PCs. As the next step, PNB needed to find a<br />
solution that would automate its business<br />
processes and link the existing PC "islands"<br />
into a more meaningful and manageable<br />
network.<br />
Business Situation<br />
Meanwhile, the banking environment in the<br />
country had undergone a sea change, with<br />
private banks and international operators<br />
entering the fray, and both retail and<br />
corporate banking operations becoming<br />
increasingly competitive and under cost<br />
pressure. Effectiveness of customer<br />
interactions was also coming under pressure<br />
with rising business volumes.<br />
IT Infrastructure at PNB<br />
With technology emerging as a key driver of<br />
business growth, the bank has taken a<br />
number of IT initiatives to provide its large<br />
clientele spread all across the country with<br />
the best of technology while retaining the allessential<br />
human warmth. Its core banking<br />
system (CBS) already acts as a single data<br />
bank, a backbone to 2,108 service outlets<br />
with internet banking services spread over 28<br />
states in the country. This deployment has<br />
lent PNB the status of being the largest core<br />
banking system in Asia.<br />
The bank has 676 ATMs and also coordinates<br />
with the MITR group of six banks with 2,200<br />
ATMs. PNB is a member of Institute<br />
Development and Research in <strong>Bank</strong>ing<br />
Technology (IDRBT)-sponsored <strong>National</strong><br />
Financial Switch (NFS) for mutual ATM<br />
transactions. NFS at present has 18 banks<br />
and a pool of 6,197 ATMs. PNB has also<br />
pioneered the cheque truncation system in<br />
India. Other software fuelling the systems are<br />
instant fund transfer mechanism, data<br />
warehouse for decision control and MIS and<br />
risk management software based on Basel II<br />
guidelines set by the <strong>Bank</strong> for International<br />
Settlements.
PNB has so far marketed BancMate (on<br />
a Corporate License basis, i.e.,<br />
complete banking on BancMate) to:<br />
1. United <strong>Bank</strong> of India<br />
2. Himachal Pradesh State Coop. <strong>Bank</strong><br />
3. Joginedra Central Coop. <strong>Bank</strong><br />
4. Haryana Ks. Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
5. Hissar-Sirsa Ks. Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
6. Himachal Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
7. Shivalik Ks. Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
8. Kapurthala-Ferozpur Ks. Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
9. Gurdaspur Amritsar K G V <strong>Bank</strong><br />
10. Shekhawati Gramin <strong>Bank</strong><br />
11. Alwar Bharatpur Anch. Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
12. Bhojpur Rohtas Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
13. Magadh Gramin <strong>Bank</strong><br />
14. Nalanda Gramin <strong>Bank</strong><br />
15. Patliputra Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
16. Kisan Gramin <strong>Bank</strong><br />
17. Devi Patan Ks. Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
18. Rani Laks.Mi Bai Ks. Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
19. Vidur Gramin <strong>Bank</strong><br />
20. Muzaffarnagar Ks. Grameen <strong>Bank</strong><br />
21. Hindon Gramin <strong>Bank</strong><br />
22. Ambala Kurushetra Gramin <strong>Bank</strong><br />
About 77 percent of its business is connected<br />
through leased lines, ISDN and VPN. Other<br />
services such as mobile banking, utility bill<br />
payments, funds transfer, e-commerce and<br />
CRM through mobile shall be introduced for<br />
the PNB branches including setting up a<br />
network operating centre (NOC) to monitor<br />
the CBS network.<br />
Since all the major branches are fully<br />
computerized and networked, PNB offers<br />
value-added services like 'anywhere anytime<br />
banking' through ATMs, and Corporate and<br />
Retail Internet <strong>Bank</strong>ing Services. New online<br />
services have also been developed—bill<br />
payment, railway ticketing, and payment of<br />
fees. For these initiatives PNB bagged the<br />
Nasscom Best IT user award in 2004 in the<br />
BFSI sector. Other acknowledgements: ITIL's<br />
certification for best practices in data<br />
centres; BIS certification for 116 offices; ISO<br />
2000 certification for services.<br />
Solution<br />
It was in this context that the IT team set<br />
about evaluating various solutions for retail<br />
automation and settled on BancMate, the<br />
multilingual solution from Natural<br />
Technologies Private Limited for retail and<br />
rural banking operations.<br />
BancMate is unique in the fact that it is a<br />
multilingual retail-banking package. A user<br />
can simultaneously use two languages within<br />
the system. Microsoft® Windows Server<br />
2003 operating system (part of Windows<br />
Server System integrated server software)<br />
was chosen as the implementation platform<br />
because of wide familiarity with the platform,<br />
as well as ease of operation and support,<br />
given the far-flung and remote branch<br />
network that the bank operates.<br />
The roll-out began in 2001 (on Windows®<br />
2000 Server operating system), and today,<br />
more than 2,300 branches are using<br />
BancMate for total branch automation and a<br />
total of around 2,400 locations will be<br />
automated by 2006. “We have been able to<br />
deploy the BancMate solution at over 2,300<br />
branches in India over the last two years,<br />
which is a unique achievement,” comments<br />
K. S. Bajwa, General Manager–IT, <strong>Punjab</strong><br />
<strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong>.<br />
BancMate runs on Microsoft Windows 2000<br />
Server and Windows Server 2003, with<br />
Microsoft SQL Server 2000 as the<br />
database. The client runs on Windows 95 and<br />
later. In smaller branches, a peer-to-peer<br />
network on two machines running Windows<br />
98 provides the infrastructure for running<br />
BancMate.<br />
It took nine months to customize the 24<br />
modules of BancMate to meet PNB’s needs.<br />
The Windows Server System–based solution<br />
provides an easy-to-understand interface,<br />
reducing not only installation and support<br />
costs, but also training costs.<br />
PNB’s Confidence<br />
Viewing the robustness of the package on the<br />
Windows platform in all aspects, PNB decided<br />
to enter into a marketing agreement with<br />
Natural Technologies to sell out the product<br />
to other banks at a reasonable price.<br />
PNB and Natural Technologies have<br />
marketed BancMate so far to seven public<br />
sector banks, 30 regional rural banks, one<br />
private sector bank, one state cooperative<br />
bank, and two cooperative banks across 28<br />
states of the country.<br />
Awards for PNB and BancMate<br />
PNB itself has gone on to win many awards<br />
for its innovative approach to IT<br />
implementation. These awards include the<br />
‘Best <strong>Bank</strong> Award for Excellence in <strong>Bank</strong>ing<br />
Technology’ by the Institute for Development<br />
and Research in <strong>Bank</strong>ing Technologies,
“We liked BancMate so<br />
much that we entered<br />
into an agreement with<br />
Natural Technologies to<br />
market it to other banks<br />
in India.”<br />
K. S. Bajwa, General Manager- IT, <strong>Punjab</strong><br />
<strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong><br />
Hyderabad, and the “Wharton Infosys<br />
Business Transformation Award–Enterprise<br />
Transformation Award’ for technology. PNB<br />
also received the ‘Innovator of the Year,’<br />
award from PC Quest, a leading Indian IT<br />
magazine, for bringing in the regional<br />
language support for rural banking that is<br />
provided in BancMate.<br />
Benefits<br />
Commenting on the benefits of BancMate<br />
and Windows Server System, Bajwa says “We<br />
chose BancMate as our rural banking<br />
solution because it is a robust solution.<br />
Together with Windows Server 2003 and SQL<br />
Server 2000, it has never given us any<br />
trouble. In addition, new IT staff members<br />
also find it easy to adapt to the solution.”<br />
Easy to Implement<br />
The implementation process is simple, fast<br />
and user friendly. In the last two years, PNB<br />
has been able to implement almost 2,300<br />
branches to BancMate and plans to complete<br />
implementation to an approximate total of<br />
2,400 locations by 2006. Adds Bajwa, “The<br />
Windows Server 2003–based solution was<br />
easy to implement as well as maintain<br />
remotely across our network of far-flung rural<br />
branches.”<br />
User Friendly Software Cuts Training<br />
Time<br />
The entire retail banking process is covered<br />
in just two screens in BancMate. This makes<br />
it very easy for bank employees to adopt the<br />
new technology. The advantage of the easyto-use<br />
features can be seen from the fact<br />
that PNB branches at rural locations have<br />
been running this solution successfully and<br />
have not faced any resistance in adoption.<br />
system and database has never given us any<br />
trouble. In addition untrained manpower also<br />
finds it easy to adapt to the solution,”<br />
explains Bajwa.<br />
Easy to Troubleshoot<br />
Further, the ease at which networking and<br />
configuration could be done—and<br />
troubleshooting—on the Windows platform<br />
meant that PNB was able to get the<br />
infrastructure up and running very fast, even<br />
in the remotest of branches.<br />
Bilingual Application Software <strong>Improves</strong><br />
Customer Relationship<br />
BancMate enables the bank to meet the<br />
directives of the Official Language Act of the<br />
country. BancMate gives the bank the ability<br />
to maintain the database in Hindi and<br />
English, as required.<br />
The multilingual solution has helped the bank<br />
maintain a better relationship with its retail<br />
and rural customers. By providing bank<br />
statements in the local language, PNB is able<br />
to bridge the divide in rural locations as well<br />
as with semi-literate customers. PNB has<br />
been able to effectively improve collections<br />
as well as to reduce bad debts and non<br />
performing assets in this market segment<br />
effectively. This is primarily due to local<br />
language support in Windows and BancMate.<br />
Scalable from Very Small to Medium<br />
Operations<br />
The scalability of the solution—from a twocomputer<br />
network to a larger one—meant<br />
that the bank could save on implementation<br />
costs by right-sizing the infrastructure to the<br />
needs of the particular branch.<br />
“The simplicity of the Windows interface has<br />
helped reduce training costs by bringing<br />
training time down to ten days. We chose<br />
BancMate as our rural banking solution<br />
because it is a robust solution. The operating<br />
Future Plans<br />
PNB has decided to have only two banking<br />
software solutions in the bank, in other<br />
words, either a core banking solution or
“The simplicity of the<br />
Windows interface has<br />
helped reduce training<br />
costs by bringing<br />
training time down to<br />
ten days..."<br />
K. S. Bajwa, General Manager- IT, <strong>Punjab</strong><br />
<strong>National</strong> <strong>Bank</strong><br />
BancMate. All the branches running on<br />
different legacy software will be migrated to<br />
either of the two solutions by June 2006.<br />
PNB has chosen Natural Technologies to<br />
develop additional modules on BancMate to<br />
enhance its features and meet the growing<br />
needs of PNB. These modules are being<br />
integrated through a distributed architecture<br />
with BancMate and a centralized architecture<br />
comprised of the bank’s core banking<br />
solution. These modules are:<br />
Proposal tracking solution to manage<br />
business proposals.<br />
Collection of excise and sales tax as per<br />
government of India regulations.<br />
Pension solution for government and<br />
personnel pensions.<br />
Retail lending module for consumer loans,<br />
vehicle loans, and so forth.<br />
Structured financial messaging system for<br />
online remittance transactions between<br />
PNB branches.<br />
Real Time Gross Settlement system for<br />
inter-bank remittance operations.<br />
PNB and Natural Technologies are now<br />
working towards consolidating the entire<br />
distributed BancMate data at the head office<br />
for the purpose of generating an enterprisewide<br />
reporting system.<br />
PNB and Natural Technologies are also<br />
developing a new bilingual BancMate<br />
centralized core banking solution based on<br />
Windows Server 2003 and SQL Server 2005.
For More Information<br />
For more information about Microsoft<br />
products and services, call the Microsoft<br />
Sales Information Center at 1600 111100.<br />
To access information using the World<br />
Wide Web, go to:<br />
www.microsoft.com/india/<br />
For more information about Natural<br />
Technologies (P) Ltd. products and<br />
services, call +91-141-2549089 or visit<br />
www.BancMate.com/<br />
For more information on <strong>Punjab</strong> <strong>National</strong><br />
<strong>Bank</strong> and its products and services, visit<br />
www.pnbindia.com<br />
About Natural Technologies Private<br />
Limited (NTPL)<br />
Natural Technologies Private Limited has<br />
created bilingual and multilingual solutions<br />
primarily for the banking industry. Natural<br />
Technologies is in the business of application<br />
development, consulting, distribution of<br />
software products, systems integration, and<br />
data processing.<br />
Microsoft Windows Server System<br />
Microsoft Windows Server System integrated<br />
server infrastructure software is designed to<br />
support end-to-end solutions built on<br />
Microsoft Windows Server 2003. It creates an<br />
infrastructure based on integrated<br />
innovation, Microsoft’s holistic approach to<br />
building products and solutions that are<br />
intrinsically designed to work together and<br />
interact seamlessly with other data and<br />
applications across your IT environment. This<br />
allows you to reduce the costs of ongoing<br />
operations; deliver a more secure and<br />
reliable IT infrastructure; and drive valuable<br />
new capabilities for the future growth of your<br />
business.<br />
For more information about Windows Server<br />
System, please go to:<br />
www.microsoft.com/windowsserversystem<br />
© 2006 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.<br />
This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT<br />
MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.<br />
Microsoft, Windows, the Windows logo, Windows Server, and<br />
Windows Server System are either registered trademarks or<br />
trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and/or<br />
other countries. All other trademarks are property of their respective<br />
owners.<br />
Published in April 2006<br />
Software and Services<br />
Products<br />
− Microsoft SQL Server 2000<br />
− Microsoft Windows 2000 Server<br />
Standard Edition<br />
− Microsoft Windows Server 2003<br />
Standard Edition<br />
Partner<br />
Natural Technologies Private Limited