Leading Through Banking's Era of Exhaustion
Thailand's banks are modernising. The real cost is time.
5/10/20261 min read
This is the structured proceedings of a closed-door executive luncheon convened in Bangkok on 26 March 2026 by The Leaders Roundtables (TLR) and 3A Ventures (3AV), in partnership with Temenos. The session brought together senior banking and technology leaders from Thailand and the wider ASEAN region to examine shared operational and strategic pressures facing the sector.
Five principal tensions shaped the conversation:
ROI accountability versus the long runway of transformation investment. Boards are asking harder questions. Examples of a major Singapore bank spending USD 20 million on AI with no clear ROI, and a leading Australian bank spending over 1.7 billion Australian dollars in IT with limited tangible outcomes, reflect a sector-wide challenge. Thailand's boards have not yet demanded immediate answers, but that moment is approaching.
Core modernisation versus the instinct to leave the core alone. CIOs consistently prefer to focus on channels, data, and orchestration, keeping the core untouched. But end-of-support timelines, the dwindling COBOL talent pool, and regulatory pressure emerging in neighbouring markets are beginning to force the issue.
Cloud optionality versus cost and sovereignty concerns. Pure public cloud strategies adopted three to five years ago are being revisited. Institutions are beginning to repatriate workloads on-premise, not for geopolitical reasons, but because the economics no longer work. All active RFPs in Thailand explicitly exclude pure public cloud dependency.
Platform breadth versus the one-trick pony risk. Specialist solutions that do one thing well cannot serve the full complexity of an established bank. The next decade requires betting on platforms with both modern architecture and functional depth.
Change velocity versus system fragility. The average timeline to implement a standard business requirement is around six months. Failed vendor engagements have cost institutions two years of lost opportunity. Even minor system changes can cascade into major operational disruptions.