From digital banking to AI: How NatWest’s India GCC is leading the innovation

NatWest Group, the UK focused bank serving over 20 million customers, has its second-largest employee base outside the UK in India. The bank’s India operations function as its Global Capability Centre (GCC), spread across three locations — Gurugram, Chennai, and Bengaluru.

The India GCC of NatWest is playing a pivotal role in enabling the digitisation framework of the bank and is corroborated by the fact that 97% of its new retail accounts were opened through digital channels.

Now, the India GCC of NatWest is stepping on to the next level by leveraging artificial intelligence (AI) to deliver newer offerings to the customers.

In an e-mail interview with EnterpriseStory, Dhiraj Anand, Head of Retail, Digital X and Retail Banking Operations India at NatWest Group India, said, “Our focus remains on delivering innovation with purpose, operational excellence, and customer-centric outcomes at scale.”

Edited excerpts:

Enterprise Story (ES): How is NatWest looking at retail banking in the present day context?

Dhiraj Anand (DA): At NatWest, we are reimagining retail banking by aligning our physical presence with the accelerating pace of digital innovation. This digital momentum was witnessed via the opening of 97% of new retail accounts through digital channels. Our strategy is clear—to create a modern, hybrid banking model that aligns with evolving customer needs and expectations. This ensures a consistent, high-quality customer experience across all touchpoints whether online, over the phone, or in person.

ES: What is India’s role behind the digital technology transformation of NatWest?

DA: India plays a pivotal role in NatWest’s digital transformation as one of the strategic Global Hubs. Our offices in Gurugram, Chennai, and Bengaluru are far more than operational centres, they are innovation engines, helping us build the agility and productivity needed to meet evolving customer expectations. The continued growth of our Bengaluru presence is a clear testament to NatWest’s long-term investment in India as a core part of our global strategy.

Our India offices employ over 17,000 professionals, which is nearly 30% of NatWest’s global workforce handling core functions such as everyday banking, digital platforms, data engineering, and regulatory reporting. A prime example of our impact is Cora, NatWest’s AI-powered virtual assistant. Cora handled over 11.2 million retail customer queries in 2024, with nearly half resolved without a human needing to intervene, demonstrating how we are using AI to deliver smarter, faster service at scale as our colleagues have more time to handle complex queries.

From India, we are not just supporting transformation, we are driving innovation and global operations for the Group. Our teams fuel the enterprise strategy led by operational excellence driving transformation across platform engineering, DevOps, and enterprise data. Our focus remains on delivering innovation with purpose, operational excellence, and customer-centric outcomes at scale.

ES: What technologies is NatWest deploying to bring about this change?

DA: At NatWest, technology is not just an enabler, it is a strategic differentiator in our transformation journey. We are deploying a carefully curated suite of advanced technologies to build a more intelligent, agile, and customer-centric bank. Central to this is our data and AI strategy, which embeds responsible AI and data ethics into the fabric of our operations ensuring innovation is both scalable and principled.

Through our collaboration with OpenAI, we’ve extended GenAI capabilities across both customer and colleague journeys—and tools like Cora+ for conversational banking and Ask Archie+, a chat bot for colleagues.

We are also modernising our platforms at scale. The migration of services like Bankline to a unified, cloud-native architecture is enabling 24/7 agility, while our recently announced collaborations with Open AI, AWS, and Accenture help us progress faster.

Our collaboration with OpenAI means we have direct and early access to their latest AI models, ensuring we can keep up with the changing pace of innovation to best serve our customers.

Our work with Accenture and AWS is accelerating our data transformation, as we reimagine our approach to data to improve personalisation for customers, help us to manage risk, better protect the bank/ customers against fraud and fincrime. The advanced AI and data capabilities will enable us to maximise the opportunity of AI and other emerging technologies and improve agility in the future.

The enhancement of our mobile banking app has been a key focus area. As of 2024, our app has 10.5 million active users, featuring easier to use functionalities and assisting our customers to succeed financially.

Today, over 20% of our analytical models are AI-enabled and improved our IT and technology capabilities by migrating certain services to cloud platforms. This integrated technology stack anchored in cloud, AI, and data allows us to deliver smarter, faster, and more personalised banking experiences, while upholding the highest standards of security, resilience, and compliance.

ES: What were the challenges encountered by NatWest in bringing this digital change?

DA: Transforming a bank of NatWest’s scale requires balancing innovation with resilience as we continue to modernise, manage costs, protect the customer, and ensure regulatory compliance.

Protecting our customers against financial frauds, deepfakes, and scams remains a constant challenge worldwide, requiring continuous vigilance. Talent is another strategic lever, attracting and retaining top digital talent in a competitive market has been a key focus. Equally critical is embedding ethical AI and data governance across our systems requiring significant investment in controls, training, and cross-functional collaboration.

We’ve made significant progress by investing over £1.1 billion in 2024 alone towards bank-wide simplification and to enhance customer experiences. Our strategy remains focused: to build a digitally resilient, customer-first bank that is fit for the future.