Behind the Growth
Not everyone makes the news. But behind every growth-driving experience, product, and transformation are experts who shaped the outcome.
Behind the Growth is a podcast for digital leaders and those aspiring to become one.
Each episode celebrates remarkable individuals, and our candid conversations focus on their struggles, wins, and lessons learned you won’t find anywhere else.
Behind the Growth
Naresh Babu on When Legacy Cores Become Black Boxes
Naresh Babu, AI Technology Leader and Digital Transformation Specialist at mobileLIVE, joins Mudassar Malik to unpack the tough decisions behind core banking modernization. Together, they explore how leaders can balance customer demands, operational resilience, and the rising costs of legacy systems.
Naresh shares how his early career as a COBOL developer shaped his understanding of resilience and why banks today must rethink their technology stacks to stay competitive. He highlights the primary drivers for modernization, including talent shortages, escalating OPEX, and shifting customer expectations, and contrasts how traditional and digital-first banks experience these pressures differently.
The discussion dives into the pros and cons of incremental upgrades versus full system replacements, with Naresh offering practical frameworks for assessing risk tolerance and aligning modernization strategies with organizational workflows. He also warns against relying on satellite systems that create blind spots and long-term technical debt.
Finally, Naresh examines how AI and cloud technologies are reshaping modernization efforts and why governance, KPI design, and a “customer downtime zero” mindset are critical for success.
Naresh dives into topics like:
- Rethinking customer expectations in banking
- The true costs of legacy systems
- When incremental upgrades backfire
- AI tools in modernization strategies
- The trap of satellite architectures
Visit mobilelive.ca/podcast to learn more about each guest and read key insights for every episode.
Visit mobilelive.ca/podcast to learn more about each guest and read key insights for every episode.