For many community credit unions, keeping pace with the rapid evolution of digital banking is a daunting, resource-heavy challenge. Discover how one cooperative FinTech is acting as a virtual CIO, breaking legacy bottlenecks and bringing future-ready digital banking to Atlantic Canada.
About the Organization:
League Data helps its 32 member credit unions across Atlantic Canada thrive in adigital-first world by providing leading-edge technology solutions and strategic guidance—all with a human touch. While some technology overcomplicates, the organization works closely with its credit unions to offer the most relevant and user-friendly solutions to serve today’s market demands and retain members throughout every stage of their financial lives.
League Data is a partner of Intellect Design Arena. In the conversation with Jessica Morettie, VP, Client Partnerships, Intellect Design Arena, Rajesh Ambarasu discusses how League Data is translating its role as a cooperative fintech into digital-age innovation.League Data has a very interesting model, supporting over 30 credit unions in Atlantic Canada. As a cooperative fintech, League Data plays the role of CIO and technology provider, aligning with the long-term strategy of the credit unions to solve technology challenges so credit unions can focus entirely on serving their members.
As League Data looks to the future, they are implementing Intellect’s eMACH.ai Digital Engagement Platform (DEP) to power the digital banking experience. This transformation aims to build future-ready solutions that accelerate innovation, modernize core banking, and support credit unions with API-built, cloud-native technologies.
Jessica: How does League Data’s model as a cooperative fintech differ from a typical vendor for the credit unions?
Rajesh Ambarasu: We play the role of CIO and technology provider for all the 30-plus credit unions. We work with major vendors, especially with the DEP platform, so it’s one we are happy to be integrated with. We play the role of aggregator and provide the technologies to the credit union. That solves a problem for the credit union not to worry about the technology; they worry about the members. Back to your question about how we differentiate ourselves from other technology providers, it’s because we align with the long-term strategy of the credit unions. That makes a clear difference, and we are not interested in selling this license to the credit unions. We strongly believe in supporting the credit union by providing the technology to the credit unions.
Jessica: When collaborating with your credit unions to select a digital banking experience to layer over your unified platform, what were the most critical considerations in your decision-making process?
Rajesh Ambarasu: Yeah, one of the critical things that we would like to have as part of our partnership, and this is one of the key reasons that we are partnering with Intellect Design, is the future-ready solutions. The last few years, we have been working on modernizing the core banking platform so we can partner with vendors like Intellect Design and prepare the credit unions for future readiness. Obviously, down the road, we have so many things lining up like open banking or so many technologies lined up with AI. We need to have a partnership with technology providers who align with our strategy to support the credit unions. That’s a key thing that we would like to have before we make any decision to partner with any technology providers. Also, we need to make sure our current platform is an API-built, scalable platform. From another partner, we would like to make sure they have the similar technology scalability to support us and, eventually, the credit unions and members as well.
Jessica: Before the partnership, were there particular things that were creating bottlenecks for your credit unions that credit unions wanted to change?
Rajesh Ambarasu: Absolutely. We would like to innovate at a faster pace. One of the challenges that we had was the slow change, which is a bottleneck for us. We would like to cope with the speed the way technology grows. You can see AI everywhere or how to make the members’ lives easier, right? We need to bring a lot of technology to help them. That changed the pace at which we are thinking on our roadmap. The existing integration had a bit of slowness, which does not align with our goals. That’s where DEP and Intellect Design really help us, and we’re really looking forward to that fast change, and hopefully, we’ll have a good partnership together.
Jessica: Are there particular features that you’re hearing from your credit unions that their members are looking for or that they’re most excited about regarding this change?
Rajesh Ambarasu: Absolutely. Digital onboarding is one of the key features that members would like to do. There is a variety of membership. We used to have elderly people, and now we have Gen Z. As you can see, it’s a different variety of membership that the credit unions have. A lot of people now, even the elderly people, would like to do everything at their fingertips. Digital onboarding and mobile apps are key for League Data and eventually for the credit unions as well. That API-built, cloud-native platform is an ideal key component that we always look for, and I think that’s where DEP supports us very well and aligns very well in this collaboration.
And when I talk about the technology, it’s not just about a feature. A lot of times, technology providers talk about cloud-native and stuff, but what is more important is how best it’s aligned with the Canadianized version. How it supports Canada’s policies, procedures, everything. I think that’s where DEP has past experience as well. That’s one of the key components we don’t want to neglect or ignore. We want to ensure payments follow canada regulatory rules. That’s our responsibility as a technology provider for credit unions. We want to make sure everything is aligned. I think that’s where DEP will align with our roadmaps. They don’t have to focus on what cloud is, what onboarding is, what the UI is, or what the technology behind it is. They don’t have to worry about it. They just have to focus on serving the members.
Rajesh Ambarasu: Yeah, one of the critical things that we would like to have as part of our partnership, and this is one of the key reasons that we are partnering with Intellect Design, is the future-ready solutions. The last few years, we have been working on modernizing the core banking platform so we can partner with vendors like Intellect Design and prepare the credit unions for future readiness. Obviously, down the road, we have so many things lining up like open banking or so many technologies lined up with AI. We need to have a partnership with technology providers who align with our strategy to support the credit unions. That’s a key thing that we would like to have before we make any decision to partner with any technology providers. Also, we need to make sure our current platform is an API-built, scalable platform. From another partner, we would like to make sure they have the similar technology scalability to support us and, eventually, the credit unions and members as well.
Jessica: Moving so many credit unions away from legacy systems like Forge is a monumental task. What is giving you the confidence that this is going to be successful in terms of working together with Intellect to do this transformation?
Rajesh Ambarasu: Yeah, absolutely. The transformation is pretty massive, I would say. And it’s not new for League Data. We have done this in the last couple of years. We did core conversions at a rapid pace in less than 48 hours. We had a lot of challenges that we went through, so we understand the complexity around it, and we built a process on top of it. It’s not new for DEP as well, and it’s proven within the Canada market. So, that will align. We know what’s going on, what the difficulties are before us, and we have a process. We have a solution for that, and I think both Intellect Design and League Data are ready to take the challenge with our past experience. We are ready to take the challenge together for sure.
Jessica: The pace for innovation and making changes with current systems is slow, without much self-service. With all of that baked into DEP, what kind of impact do you think that will have for League Data and for your credit unions?
Rajesh Ambarasu: Yeah, I think from the credit union perspective, not everybody would be ready for the change, right? For some of the smaller credit unions, it might be too fast for them. For some of the larger credit unions, they might think, “Oh, we need to go a bit even faster.” So, I think League Data makes that bridge. We provide the confidence for the smaller, medium, or larger-sized credit unions. Even for smaller credit unions, they might have some anxiety saying, “How is it going to work with members onboarding themselves?” We show them how DEP works and how League Data supports from the technology perspective. Not just the technology perspective, but how best we can customize the core banking or onboarding process to adapt not just for the larger credit unions, but even for the smaller credit unions. That’s where they gain the confidence to say, “Yes, we trust League Data,” and eventually they trust Intellect Design to support them, right? They don’t have to feel anxiety within the credit unions about their members. So, I think that’s a key component that solves the problem. The partnership between Intellect Design and League Data is going to solve that.
I think some of the medium-sized credit unions are interested in technology as well, so we support them in a different manner. We don’t provide the same format of support for all the credit unions. Depending on their need, we support them with different technology or other supports that the credit union needs.
Jessica: If we’re sitting here a year from now, what does success look like for League Data and for your credit unions that you’re on this journey with?
Rajesh Ambarasu: Yeah, I think we are already in the first step, ready to convert to the new digital banking platform. So, I have no doubt that we’ll successfully migrate. I think that’s step one. Then in a year from now, the credit unions should have the confidence that members can serve themselves better with digital onboarding, and understand how the technology is going to serve them better. When they use all the features that DEP provides, I think they’re going to make themselves very comfortable. That’s a key success that we would like to see from the credit union member perspective. Let’s say if tomorrow a member says, “I can make my bill payment through my online banking platform. I don’t have to come to the credit union. I can serve myself.” If the member and eventually the credit union have that level of confidence, then that’s the success for League Data.
Author:
Rajesh Anbarasu,
Technology Lead,
League Data
