By Art Gillis
There’s nothing really new, hot, or compelling enough for bankers to jump into the tech marketplace and engage in shopping sprees. Here are some milestones of previous good times in order to provide a basis for comparison with today. We’re now in a decade of single-digit annual budget increases (7%), and this for the first time in four decades. I hope Yogi was right when he said it ain’t over till it’s over.

'70s

• ATMs, MasterCard, BankAmericard and EFT Networks
  
• Mini computers that provided the reason for software companies such as ITI (now Fiserv), Jack Henry (still Jack Henry), Precision (now Fiserv), Horizon (now Fidelity), and Kirchman (now Metavante) to develop turnkey systems so bankers could exercise their control and operate their own backroom support, without a meter ticking.
  
• CIF - Central Information File (a.k.a. Customer Information File).
  
• Interfaces - A necessary evil. Sorta like, if ya wanna get on the plane, ya gotta go thru security.
  
• COBOL - a programming language that was supposed to be as easy as writing sentences in English. Later to become a Y2K hurdle because experienced COBOL programmers were either drawing pensions or pushing up daisies, while legacy systems had discovered the Fountain of Youth.
  
• Mainframe software - a reel of tape and thousands of programmers if you want it to work.
  

'80s

• The PC. In 1985, my book, Micros in Banking, profiled 21 new companies that created applications software that could run on a $5,000 computer. Every bank bought a PC, even though the shrink wrap hadn’t come off right away. Wouldn’t Dell love that kind of carefree buying attitude right about now.
  
• Continued implementation of in-house turnkey systems - 1984 and 1985 had peak sales of turnkey systems, never to be reached again - 1,000 per year, and that didn’t include the tech-weak credit unions who were more interested in the price of kielbasa than the license fee for a core system.
  
• A reawakening of service bureau vendors who noticed the threat of newbies with better solutions. Enter the IBM/Kodak deal creating legitimacy with a new word - outsourcing.
  
• Online banking (not the Internet type) which replaced some batch processing and day- delay postings. A very few were even real time.
  
• Telecommunications systems. Goodbye courier excuses like my van broke down, what traffic, the snow drifts were eight feet high. When Check 21 arrived, it put another nail in the airborne courier’s coffin as well as new excuses - The fog was thicker than pea soup.
  
• Document imaging to replace hardcopy and microfiche.
  
• An early attempt at the idea of integration, mostly in sales brochures.
  

'90s

• Y2K
  
• Intelligence-based workstations (a.k.a. PCs) to replace dumb CRT terminals.
  
• Branch Automation (a.k.a. Platform Automation)
  
• Internet banking
  
• A first attempt at check imaging that proved to be too expensive because it wasn’t scalable.
  
• Anything with the word “mortgage” in it.
  
• Relational DataBase Management Systems that were supposed to do marketing and mining, but they were too generic and too difficult to structure into banking apps.
  

Early '00s

• Check imaging becomes ubiquitous. Image exchange - we’ll get to it one of these years
  
• Customer Relationship Management - It sounds great, but try to implement it.
  
• Attention to all kinds of “what if” situations associated with bank technology (terrorism, natural disasters, smart kids, scam artists, the Congress, regulatory agencies). Wow! Two- password authentication is like Willie Sutton handing two notes to a teller.
  
• Slow gear-up for electronic presentment and payments, once called eCommerce.
  
• Treasury services (a.k.a. cash management), but this time using the Internet.
  
• India, Philippines, China, Eastern Europe and places cheap. Any way to save a buck.
  

Today

• Additional Check 21 implementation.
  
• A historically low level of new core system implementations (4.2% of all FIs).
  
• Maintenance, tweaking, fine tuning, cost cutting. Nothing here for vendors.
  
• Using the Web to offer a pseudo open architecture, but with virtual results.
  
• Electronic payments continue at a snail’s pace and will forever.
  

In my opinion, until new solutions appear, buying sprees will occur when tech companies buy tech companies. The only organic thing these companies will see is what’s in a Whole Foods store. This negative outlook might change if solutions providers could figure out how to make their customers more competitive than another vendor’s customers. They’re all selling commodities that after 40 years have become a bit stale. Can I interest you in a bushel of Grade AAA corn (a.k.a. my DDA system)?

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