<\/p>\n
Standard Bank Group is pivoting from isolated tool adoption to embedding artificial intelligence (AI) as an operational capability across its business.<\/p>\n
Africa\u2019s biggest bank by assets reported this week that over 39 000 employees, representing 72% of its total workforce, are active users of generative AI tools.<\/p>\n
Read: Standard Bank and UnionPay expand e-commerce across 9 African markets<\/p>\n
Additionally, approximately one-third of its technology staff are utilising AI-enabled coding applications, driving early productivity gains of roughly 20%.<\/p>\n
The bank says it operates an enterprise AI platform built on Amazon Bedrock using a multi-model approach, allowing it to evaluate and run both open and closed models under centralised security protocols.<\/p>\n
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\u201cWe are transitioning from simply using AI tools to becoming an AI-enabled organisation. That is a fundamentally bigger ambition,\u201d says Margaret Nienaber, COO of Standard Bank Group, in outlining why technology access alone no longer offers a defensible moat.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe winners in AI will not necessarily be the organisations with access to the newest technology, because increasingly many organisations will have access to similar models and tools. The real differentiator will be how effectively you combine that technology with trusted data, strong governance, the right skills and deep knowledge of your clients and markets,\u201d she adds.<\/p>\n
\u201cAI is becoming a core long-term competitive capability rather than simply a technology capability. Our focus is on embedding it into how we serve clients, how we support our people and how we run the group, creating a foundation for long-term growth,\u201d notes Nienaber.<\/p>\n
The iceberg strategy<\/p>\n
Standard Bank says that it structures its integration through an \u201ciceberg\u201d operational framework, balancing visible client-facing tools with backend system investments.<\/p>\n
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\u201cAI can give our people time back, but what we do with that time is what really matters,\u201d says Nienaber.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to reinvest it in the things humans do particularly well: judgement, creativity, relationships, empathy and solving complex problems for clients. This is why we see AI as augmenting our people rather than simply automating work. Technology on its own is not the competitive advantage \u2013 the advantage comes from what our people are able to do with it,\u201d she adds.<\/p>\n
According to the bank, the group\u2019s tech deployment was reflected in the inaugural Evident AI Index for Banks in the Middle East and Africa (published June 2026), where Standard Bank ranked first among African banks and second overall across the Middle East and Africa region.<\/p>\n
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#AIenabled #organisation #Standard #Banks #Margaret #Nienaber<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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