With its new AI-powered data vault, UnionBank has been enhancing hyper-personalization, operational efficiency, and customer-centric innovation.
In the Philippines, government initiatives have been incentivizing the banking industry to undergo continual digitalization.
As such, the country’s national bank has been tasked to lead by example. For example, UnionBank has always imbibed automation of manual processes; leveraging technology to deliver industry-leading financial products; and innovating in terms of cross-selling, maximizing sales and engagement touchpoints and customer service excellence.
In line with this mandate, the bank was announced on 4 April 2025 to have built a “data vault” to fuel its AI and ML operations. This is a centralized, organized, clean, governed, and easily accessible repository of quality data sources and assets. Through this platform, the bank’s developers can create data-centric applications and solutions using high quality and governed data assets. The solutions can open data management capabilities to application programming interfaces (APIs), business process automation, robotic process automation, and low-code development platforms in use by the bank.
Said the bank’s Chief Information and Operations Officer, Dennis Omila: “Our aim is to continue being a digital banking trailblazer in the Philippines, and we believe data is the cornerstone to help us achieve that. We sought to harness data to drive digital transformation to stay ahead of these banking trends by meeting the needs of digital-savvy users and mitigating risk.”
Duly armed with this central data hub that powers a new suite of AI/ML capabilities, UnionBank has been continually improving its standard of customer offerings. Data scientists and business users work together to leverage AI and ML to build new capabilities in operations for bancassurance, credit cards, and auto loans:
- For bancassurance products, a new AI model leverages data such as customers’ average daily balance on record or the relationship manager’s personal network of customers, to create more leads
- Similar models have helped the bank’s tele sales and electronic direct mailers to achieve substantial increases in the average monthly conversion rate in credit cards.
- Monthly auto loans conversion rates have also increased.
- With the data centralization, a multitude of business and process improvements are being realized, including more time saved, higher conversion rates, effective hyper-personalization and customization of all products to maintain better affinity with customers.
- Utilizing data effectively is helping UnionBank to stay ahead of trends and discover new opportunities to enrich the Philippines’ banking and economic landscapes.
Building on this successful momentum, UnionBank intends to further utilize data and AI/ML to drive more business value by exploring solutions with its technology vendors, including Cloudera, the platform that powers its “data vault”.
