Nationwide deploys AI to reduce back-end system complexity
Nationwide Building Society has deployed an artificial intelligence system to reduce the complexity of the back-end systems of its digital products. The ignio neural automation system, from﻿ Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), automates and optimises the IT operations and processes of a business. According to Mike Pighills, Head of Service Integration and Transition at Nationwide, Ignio will blueprint the company's IT batch system, which will allow the ignio﻿ to model and predict the impact of business or technological level changes and events, whilst presenting solutions to help the company make better and more informed decisions. 

Source: Tata Consultancy Services

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), (BSE: 532540, NSE: TCS) a leading global IT services, consulting and business solutions organisation, today announced a new partnership with Nationwide Building Society in the UK for the provision of the ignio neural automation system which will initially be used for Batch Performance and Capacity Management.

Nationwide, a long-standing TCS customer, selected TCS’ Services-as-Software platform ignio - the world’s first neural automation system for enterprise IT - as part of its continued transformation of its technology and operations. As the world’s largest building society, Nationwide delivers a wide range of products to its customers and recognises the importance of deploying new services rapidly and increasing the resilience of its digital solutions. With their digital portfolio expanding in recent years, the Nationwide IT team chose ignio as a solution for delivering intelligent automation in order to reduce operational risks and simultaneously improve efficiency and responsiveness.



Mike Pighills, Head of Service Integration and Transition, Nationwide Building Society commented: “Moving all of our services on to a digital platform, while ensuring a high level of resilience and agility, is a major priority for Nationwide. In recent years, as our business has grown and new services have been introduced, our back-end systems have become ever more complex. ignio will help us to simplify the management of these systems, giving us greater efficiency and control over critical aspects of our IT.”



ignio is designed to automate and optimise the IT operations and processes of an enterprise to improve speed and flexibility, reduce operational risks and enhance user experience. Inspired by the human neural system, machine learning and other digital technologies, the ignio platform has the capacity to sense, think and act, as well as constantly learn and adapt to enterprises’ context. ignio is offered as a Services-as-Software platform, which can be deployed either on-premise and/or on the cloud depending on the needs of the business.



By integrating information from a wide range of sources, ignio has the ability to blueprint and self-learn an enterprise’s technology and operations context. This provides organisations the ability to make informed decisions quickly as well as self-heal from operational incidents, while reducing the reliance on manual processes and modelling tasks.



As a first step in the journey, following successful proof of concept testing, ignio’s IT Batch Blueprinting along with Batch Performance and Capacity Management capabilities will now be deployed across Nationwide’s IT Batch systems. “By allowing us to create a blueprint of our Batch systems, ignio gives us the ability to quickly and easily model and predict the impact of business or technology-level changes and events on our batch systems and develop proactive plans accordingly,” Mr Pighills added.



Prof Harrick Vin, VP & Chief Scientist, Tata Consultancy Services, said: “The digital revolution has created many opportunities for businesses like Nationwide, but it also brings challenges, perhaps the most significant of which is the rapidly increasing complexity of IT. New digital products for customers, combined with the vast amounts of data that today’s organisations have to process, can make it difficult to make fast, informed decisions. We are delighted that Nationwide has chosen ignio to be a part of their transformation journey. We are confident that ignio will make a real difference to Nationwide’s ability to anticipate and respond to opportunities in this hyper-connected age.”



Shankar Narayanan, Country Head UK & Ireland, Tata Consultancy Services, said: “ignio is a next-generation platform for the enterprise. Its capability to scale automation benefits, while accommodating enterprises’ technology and process diversity, is unparalleled in the industry. Ignio’s services-as-software model is a real game changer. We are very excited about its potential to transform enterprise IT and Operations.”

