Brad Mroz, Senior Partner Manager, Thought Machine
Scott Lohman, Product Marketing Director, Salesforce Financial Services Cloud
Legacy technology has held back the pace of innovation in the financial services industry. From point-to-point integrations to monolithic architectures, many of today’s banking applications are not built with the agility required to deliver the personalised products, insights, and services today’s customers expect. Banks are desperately trying to innovate but face challenges from their inability to build new capabilities on top of inflexible legacy technology and the uncertainty and complexity of managing these new integrations once developed.
Particularly problematic is the disconnect between systems of record, such as a core banking system, and systems of engagement, like Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems. This leaves banks in the uncomfortable situation of putting potentially unreliable or out-of-date customer information in front of customer service representatives or forcing them to toggle between multiple systems and/or screens to retrieve information – both negatively impact customer experience. Banks have attempted to solve this problem with awkward, costly and error-prone point-to-point integrations, yet connectivity remains a significant pain point.
To address this specific issue, among others, Thought Machine and Salesforce partnered to build an integration between Thought Machine’s cloud-native core banking platform, Vault Core, and Salesforce’s Financial Services Cloud. Banks can reduce development costs and accelerate time to market by using turnkey integrations made possible by the MuleSoft Anypoint platform. This out-of-the-box, certified integration leverages industry-standard banking APIs for common processes to enable banks to build, deploy and deliver the products and services they need to remain competitive. Financial institutions that follow this approach present more cohesive customer experiences at the right time.
Beyond Financial Services Cloud, banks that adopt Salesforce’s Data Cloud and Thought Machine’s Vault Core can rapidly integrate the cloud-native core banking platform into their technology ecosystem to deliver original insights, on-demand analytics, and timely customer campaigns powered by Vault Core’s real-time transaction data. Salesforce Data Cloud is the hyperscale data engine that brings all of a financial institution’s data to Salesforce. Data Cloud enables users to build a comprehensive, 360-degree customer view across all products, services, and interactions, ensuring all bankers and operations team members can quickly access and easily act on centralised, real-time information.
Vault Core’s MuleSoft Connectors enable quick integration to additional applications in the bank’s technology ecosystem. IT operations can now configure processes with clicks, not code, to accelerate value realisation and innovation. The integration flexibility allows the bank to adopt a best-of-breed ecosystem of partners to launch new products or modernise operations. This offering unlocks efficient, automated, and personalised banking experiences by integrating data flows and enabling real-time, cross-platform functionality. For example, banks can launch a new product on Vault Core, like a revolving line of credit, service customers through Salesforce Financial Services Cloud, and improve customer insights using prebuilt analytics within Data Cloud.
With Salesforce, we are helping banks accelerate innovation. According to the Connectivity Benchmark Report, 58% of IT decision-makers had difficulty delivering integrated experiences, so we decided to focus on that problem together. The MuleSoft Certified Connector and Templates for Vault Core, which support the seamless adoption of Vault Core and real-time data, are now accessible in Salesforce’s Anypoint Exchange, allowing banks to simplify ecosystem integrations, reduce development time, unlock access to real-time data, and power next-generation business processes.
Partnership Perspective
“Our partnership with Salesforce allows banks to take control of their product roadmap. Banks are now able to build new, innovative products without vendor dependency, establish the capabilities to power personalised insights and servicing, and quickly integrate into any ecosystem.” - Randy McFarlane, Global Head of Partnerships, Thought Machine
“At Salesforce, our goal with Financial Services Cloud is to help banks innovate and understand their customers better. Our partnership with Thought Machine is a great example of how we’re helping our customers realise faster time to value, process data at scale, and apply AI to help build more streamlined, automated and personalised client engagement experiences that drive better business outcomes.” – Eran Agrios, SVP & GM of Financial Services, Salesforce
Learn More
Banks can learn more about Vault Core, how to leverage real-time transaction data within Salesforce’s ecosystem, and deliver incredible customer service or reach out to partnerships@thoughtmachine.net