Transforming Community Banking: How Genesis Core Systems is Leading a Technological Revolution
By Frank Pendle
Introduction
For the past four decades, community banking has been hampered by legacy systems that were antiquated when they were first deployed. They have since acquired the dubious reputation of being some of the least flexible systems in existence. Heightened competition from larger banks, seismic shifts in the global economy, and the relentless demands of consumers for more personalized, efficient products have battered the ability of community banks to compete and stay relevant for clients. Genesis Core Systems is a fundamental transformation of the world of community banking – it’s a core systems solution to a problem that is overdue.
The Current Landscape of Core Banking Systems
Consider old-style core banking systems that have, for decades, processed the most basic banking transactions (like depositing a cheque) and monitored routine account activities (like moving around cash) with a sort of dogged reliability. For years, these back-of-the-bank systems have quietly done their jobs - but only because they were built on tried and tested technology. For community banks, this translates into living with a significant deficit in terms of clearly expressed customer expectations about how banking ‘should’ work, relative to technology, customer types and service ecosystems at bigger, more digitized institutions. The cost of the deficit is a level of responsiveness that translates into being less competitive.
Genesis Core Systems: A Beacon of Innovation
Unlike a traditional provider, Genesis Core Systems was built to last. A modern architecture includes functionality that helps meet bank today’s needs, including:
• Scalability: Easily scales to meet growing customer demands without disruptive migrations or system downtimes.
• Flexibility: Gives banks the possibility to adapt products and services to meet the needs of a local audience.
• Integration: This capability makes it easier to work with other third-party applications and services, helping banks provide services across a larger domain of functions or with greater efficiency.
• Security: Includes the latest in cybersecurity technologies and is designed to ensure the highest level of security by keeping the online cashier safe from the latest threats to customer data.
Addressing the Technological Shortcomings of Traditional Providers
While traditional core providers, such as Fiserv, operate on a philosophy of one size fits all, this philosophy is increasingly unsound. A highly configurable system can cost far more to maintain than a far more rigid system and regularly requires enormous outlay in reconstructing its systems. Many institutions have had to break down functioning and essential systems in order to upgrade you. But Genesis is not developed on this philosophy. It can be upgraded in small bits, and never needs wholesale system replacement.
Genesis: The Only Viable Solution for Today's Market
For a community bank, rooted in its locality and facing shifting demands that they must serve in real time, this agility isn’t just a nice-to-have, it’s a must-have. The legacy providers demonstrate over and over again that they’re not designed to support quick deployments of emerging technologies or iterative adjustments to existing ones. This is not how Genesis operates. It’s install-every-day.
The Impact of Genesis on Community Banking
As a pioneer in community banking, Genesis has the potential to fundamentally change the game. By providing a sophisticated solution tailored for community banks, Genesis enables these institutions to:
• Enhance Customer Experience: Provide customers with the service quality they expect such as mobile banking, next-generation payments, and personal financial advice.
• Drive Innovation: Make the bank irresistible to its target markets by embedding the latest technologies, such as blockchain and artificial intelligence.
• Expand Market Reach: Leverage additional capabilities and services to expand your market reach and serve a broader customer base.
Most members of the Genesis team have more than 20 years of boots-on-the-ground experience implementing a host of core offerings. We know what is out there because we have been there. A major hurdle for all vendors is that they are limited by their intellectual property. If they acquire a company that provides a specific module to the core system, they rather use it than develop something better or enter into a partnership agreement with another provider who has a superior model.
Genesis is not constrained by this business model; instead, Genesis integrates the best core and peripheral modules available, creating a one-stop solution for community banks. Genesis frequently adapts modules that serve hundreds of banks, including Tier 1 and 2 institutions, to make you suitable for the specific business needs and operational constraints of community banks. Thus, Genesis is truly delivering the dream system that community banks could never afford before, at a price they can manage and with support for their existing IT resources. Our code is well-established within the banking sector, which significantly reduces the risks for community banks using the Genesis core system.
Moreover, Genesis has a broader answer than any system vendor, as per our best-of-breed technology module strategy for any business need that comes our way. This will be more apparent to our customers, particularly in areas traditionally referred to by legacy core system vendors as peripheral systems – Internet banking, payments, CRM, BaaS products and business processes.
Genesis is deliberately pitching a bolder vision than legacy providers. You will lower your cost to serve and also connect service providers with banks to help you fulfill the basic function that banks were created to do: to hold and grow the community’s financial services.
Genesis's Role in Modernizing Community Banks
Modernizing core banking systems is one of the biggest challenges for community banks, and the FDIC’s 2020 Community Banking Study provides some insight on why. There are five major areas of the banking industry that the FDIC highlighted as community banks seek ways to adapt to the digital age. First, the study attests to the fact that community banks have historically been traditional models of banks. Because of this, they have been slower to adopt new digital technologies than bigger banks with the financial means to do so. The longer cybersecurity risk factors exist, the more difficult all financial institutions will face as computer systems become more important to operations. High cost, extreme complexity, and often fear of failure have all served as deterrents for community banks to modernize their core systems.
All these can be addressed by Genesis Core Systems. GCS offers an affordable, scalable, and flexible core solution that helps community banks to:
· Adapt More Quickly to Regulatory Changes: With modular updates and a flexible architecture, banks can implement regulatory changes more swiftly and with less disruption.
· Improve Operational Efficiency: Streamline operations through automation and improved data management, reducing errors and lowering costs.
· Enhance Risk Management: Utilize advanced analytics and real-time data processing to better assess and manage risks.
Conclusion
To conclude this narrative, Genesis Core Systems is here to usher in a new age of technology for community banking. Genesis is a solution of the future – designed specifically for the challenges of the community bank. Genesis Core Systems will aid community banks in transitioning to the digital age. It is important that the community banks utilize this solution to stay on top of digital advancements. This is the main way community banks can compete in a future that is digital dominated, according to the FDIC’s 2020 Community Banking Study. Also, the ability of the community banks to adapt and respond to technological change is crucial for their survival and for their growth. Genesis Core Systems will help you to not only continue as a more efficient entity but also place you in a position to survive and thrive.
The implications for the community banking sector are enormous: here is a model that could liberate banks from legacy ecosystems and open the door to a future in which technology enhanced capability and competitiveness. Built to scale, Genesis allows banks to adapt swiftly to market shifts and regulatory changes, without the cost and disruption associated with existing, monolithic core system upgrades.
Additionally, Genesis’ improved data management and integration capabilities allow community banks to utilize big data analytics and advanced algorithms that are critical for informed decision-making and strategic planning, enabling you to optimize their risk management and expansion into new markets.
In the years ahead, a relationship with an innovative and dedicated vendor such as Genesis Core Systems could well be among the most important investments for community banks in positioning yourselves for the future. It will not only provide the bank with the tools it needs to operate effectively. It will also position the community bank in the eyes of the customers as one that is both visionary and customer- and financially sound.
Genesis is not a vendor to us but a partner in the real renaissance of community banking – innovation and efficiency to the places that need it most.
