Philippines’ EastWest Bank taps Temenos SaaS to modernise core banking

By Gloria Methri

EastWest Banking Corporation, one of the Philippines’ leading universal banks, has partnered with Temenos to modernise its core banking operations. The move is part of EastWest’s broader strategy to enhance customer experience, drive operational efficiency, and deliver innovative financial solutions at scale.

By adopting Temenos Core as a SaaS platform for its Retail, SME, and Corporate banking operations, EastWest will transition to a more agile, secure, and cloud-native banking infrastructure. The modernisation initiative will support the bank’s efforts to serve over 3 million customers across a national network of 400 branches with greater speed and resilience.

“At EastWest, our customers are at the heart of everything we do. Temenos SaaS is a crucial step in our digital transformation journey, as it allows us to offer a more seamless and personalised banking experience—whether through our mobile app, branch network, or customer support channels,” said Barani Sundaram, Chief Technology Officer at EastWest. “By modernising our core banking systems, we are ensuring that we can continue to meet the evolving needs of our customers while staying agile in a fast-changing financial landscape.”

The transformation will enable a unified, data-driven approach across all areas of the bank, facilitating faster product innovation, enhanced customer-centricity, and greater integration with FinTech partners. This will empower EastWest to scale new services efficiently, including expansion into areas such as Wealth Management.

“We are excited to work with Temenos, a global leader in banking technology, as we take this important step forward,” Sundaram added. “This investment marks EastWest’s drive to elevate digital banking for Filipinos—bringing secure, elegantly designed, and intuitively smart financial tools within easy reach, shaped around the pace and preferences of modern life.”

The Temenos SaaS platform will support a wide array of banking functions, including customer accounts, deposits, lending, payments, and trade finance. Its cloud-native architecture will help EastWest respond more quickly to regulatory changes and evolving customer demands, while also reducing the burden of legacy systems.

“We are proud to partner with EastWest, a major player in the Philippine banking sector, to transform its core banking in the cloud,” said Will Dale, Managing Director – APAC, Temenos. “The bank was looking for a SaaS solution that combined deep functionality and the latest technology, which is where Temenos excels. We look forward to supporting EastWest in driving the next phase of their impressive growth.”