BoB, Vijaya, Dena top brass to brainstorm on merger

Senior officials of Bank of Baroda (BoB), Vijaya Bank and Dena Bank, including their general managers, will brainstorm at a twoday conclave, which will begin on Thursday, to ensure a smooth merger.

The meeting comes ahead of commencing business as merged entity on April 1.

Till now, only the managing directors, executive directors three banks were working together, while general managers and deputy managers were held one-to-one meetings.

Senior Bank of Baroda officials said the integration was a two-year journey starting April 1. All general managers from the three banks are meeting together for the first time on March 15-16.

The work done for integration and issues that would have to be dealt through the transition would be discussed through presentations at the meeting. The key elements would include information technology systems and software.

Till the end of March, three banks have distinct identities with a separate balance sheet. The consolidated balance sheet would be done for quarter ending June 2019.

In the next three-five months, the work on assimilation of branches customers, branches and employees. As for technology integration, all three of them are on Finacle platform.

While BoB has recently migrated to version 10 of the software, other two banks are on the seventh version.

Learnings from BoB’s migration will come handy to move Vijaya and Dena’s systems to version 10. Whatever problems bank of Baroda faced and solved can be rectified in the case of these two banks, making transition process easier.

The signage (commercial or public display signs) will remain same for the two banks (Vijaya and Dena) for two-three months for the benefit of customers.

The board will carry statement that now it is part of Bank of Baroda. So, gradually customers become accustomed to changes. This is being done keeping in mind emotional attachment of customers and employees to a brand, executives of Bank of Baroda said.