Transforming mobile banking with real-time data: The role of IBM mainframes

When you think of modern banking, mobile apps and personalized customer experiences often take center stage. But behind these innovations lie a critical enabler: real-time enterprise data.

IBM mainframes are at the heart of this transformation. For decades, they have served as the backbone of global financial systems. Today, their role is more pivotal than ever—they are the essential foundation for delivering instant, personalized mobile banking experiences.

However, a key challenge is the data latency inherent in legacy systems, which often leaves financial institutions relying on stale or outdated data that fails to meet the demands of real-time decision-making. IBM® Data Gate and Watsonx.data™ address this issue by enabling seamless, real-time access to mainframe data, allowing banks to power use cases such as instant credit score updates, real-time fraud detection and personalized budget forecasting—all critical for meeting customer expectations in the digital age.

Originally developed during World War II to solve complex computational challenges, IBM mainframes have evolved into the global financial system's critical infrastructure, processing 70% of the world’s daily transactions. Their unmatched reliability helps ensure that 77 of the top 100 banks depend on them for their operations. However, as customer expectations shift toward personalized, real-time digital experiences, banks must unlock the full potential of their mainframe data to stay competitive.

As mobile banking continues its rapid evolution, real-time data has become a cornerstone of success. Studies show that 99% of Gen Z and 98% of millennials use mobile banking apps to manage budgets, track credit scores and forecast spending. For these customers, personalized, real-time insights are no longer optional—they are a baseline expectation. Meeting this demand requires modernizing how data moves from IBM mainframes to cloud-based, AI-driven applications.

This isn’t just a technological shift—it’s a business imperative.

While IBM mainframes excel in reliability and scalability, their batch-based architecture and reliance on legacy data formats such as Virtual Sequential Access Method (VSAM) and Information Management System (IMS) pose challenges. These data fromats are not compatible with modern formats like Apache Iceberg (used by snowflake) and Delta Lake (used by databricks). As a result, natively integrating with today’s real-time analytics and AI-driven tools may create a gap that banks must address to meet modern customer expectations. 

IBM Data Gate and Watsonx close this gap by enabling the seamless integration of mainframe data into modern, cloud-based ecosystems. Together, they transform transactional data into actionable insights for mobile banking applications.

IBM Data Gate transforms legacy formats like VSAM and IMS into relational table formats optimized for analytics. By synchronizing IBM Z® data with Watsonx's open data lakehouse architecture, banks can access real-time transactional data without impacting existing operations. This seamless integration enables applications to deliver instant updates, such as real-time credit score tracking and monthly budget forecasting, ensuring that customers always have the most accurate insights at their fingertips.

With IBM Data Gate, banks can deliver the instant, personalized experiences that today’s customers expect. Whether it’s helping Gen Z users manage budgets or enabling millennials to track credit scores in real-time, these tools empower banks to provide data-driven personalization at scale.

IBM Data Gate minimizes the impact of AI workloads on mainframe performance. By synchronizing mainframe data into cloud-based environments, banks can run intensive analytics and AI processes without disrupting transactional systems, ensuring reliability and cost-efficiency.

IBM Data Gate and Watsonx are more than solutions; they are the bridge between legacy systems and the future of banking. By enabling real-time access to mainframe data, these tools allow financial institutions to meet the demands of a digitally savvy customer base while maintaining operational excellence.

Whether forecasting spending patterns or offering instant credit tracking, IBM Data Gate transforms transactional data into real-time customer insights, driving innovation and satisfaction in the digital banking age.