Prestigious Forrester award recognizes its breakthrough technological transformation

WARSAW, Poland, Oct. 14, 2025 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- mBank successfully completes one of the most ambitious technology modernization programs in the European banking sector. The bank has been recognized with the top honor in the Forrester Technology Strategy Impact Award 2025 for the EMEA region (Europe, Middle East, and Africa). The award acknowledges the effective execution of a comprehensive IT transformation strategy that has completely reshaped mBank’s technological infrastructure. mBank is the first financial institution in Poland to fully modernize its core systems by migrating them to advanced technology platforms - a process known as replatforming. This milestone has accelerated the bank’s development, reduced the cost of maintaining critical systems, and strengthened its competitive edge. As a result, mBank has become more agile and responsive to external market dynamics.

The goal of the transformation program was to modernize the bank’s most critical systems while ensuring business continuity and maintaining cost control. As part of the program:

The legacy mainframe-based system was replaced with a modern solution operating on x86 architecture, which significantly improved scalability and helped reduce operational costs.
A second core system, previously based on a non-relational database with no long-term viability, was replaced with a proprietary solution running in a private cloud - delivering greater performance, resilience, scalability, and future-readiness.
A hybrid cloud environment was implemented, with more than half of the bank’s key systems successfully migrated to it.
Several production-grade solutions powered by generative artificial intelligence were launched, enhancing operational efficiency and innovation capabilities.

“There’s a lot of talk about comprehensive core system transformations in banking. At mBank, we moved from words to action and became the first financial institution in Poland to successfully carry out a full-scale modernization of both our core systems. From the very beginning, our priority was the safety and comfort of our clients, along with providing services tailored to their needs. Equally important was the uninterrupted development of business functionalities - we set ourselves a clear goal: the system change must not halt business growth for more than a single quarter. And that’s exactly how the replatforming was executed - seamlessly and without compromising development. We managed to catch up with a moving target, which makes this achievement all the more rewarding and a source of great pride” - Krzysztof Dąbrowski, Vice President of the Management Board, Chief Operating Officer and CIO at mBank.

Seamless customer migration

One of the biggest challenges was migrating approximately 6 million retail customers to the new platform. Thanks to the use of sharding architecture, which enabled simultaneous production operation of both the mainframe and x86 platforms, the transition was carried out gradually - without any service downtime or disruption to availability.

“The technological transformation we carried out over the past five years was not only a change in technology - it was a shift in how we think about system migration. To put it simply, instead of executing one massive migration of millions of customers - requiring a full system shutdown and carrying significant risk - we chose a model based on hundreds of micro-migrations performed on a live system, without any downtime. This approach allowed us to manage risk much more effectively. Innovation and technological leadership have always been part of mBank’s DNA. Equally important to us is thinking about our customers, the safety of their funds, their comfort, and their trust in us. We’re proud to have successfully combined both. The Forrester Technology Strategy Impact Award 2025 confirms that our unconventional and market-unique approach has been recognized by leading authorities in the IT industry” - Michał Plechawski, Managing Director for IT and Technology at mBank.

Innovation beyond technology

In line with the program’s objectives, mBank successfully delivered a wide range of business and regulatory projects during the modernization process - many of which required changes to core systems. Key initiatives included:

mOkazje Zakupy – the first true e-commerce marketplace integrated directly into a banking app on the Polish market,
a fully digital mortgage refinancing process,
a digital onboarding process for corporate clients,
and a significant reduction in the time required to approve corporate loans.

The award-winning core system modernization program lays the foundation for further innovation and development. Under its new strategy, “Full Speed Ahead”, mBank plans to introduce instant, secure payments available 24/7/365 over the next five years. Retail customers can expect regular updates and new service features, while corporate clients will benefit from round-the-clock access to key banking services. The list of services available on weekends will also be gradually expanded. Thanks to process transformation, mBank’s operating costs now account for just 28.2% of its revenues - one of the best ratios in the industry. The Forrester Technology Strategy Impact Award is one of the most prestigious honors in the world of business technology. It is awarded to organizations that implement technology strategies delivering real business outcomes - not only in terms of innovation, but also in operational efficiency, resilience, and customer experience. The recognition for mBank confirms its position at the forefront of technological transformation in the region. This year’s Forrester Research awards ceremony took place in the second week of October in London.

CONTACT:
Joanna Duda
mBank
+48 22 829 00 00
Joanna.Duda@mbank.pl
https://www.mbank.pl/en/

Source: mBank

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