Scotiabank Invests $2.3 Million to Create Digital Banking Lab at Ivey Business School
Brian Porter, president and CEO of Scotiabank, makes announcement during keynote address at university.

Brian Porter, president and CEO of Scotiabank, broke the news while making the keynote address as part of the J.C. Taylor Distinguished Lecture in Finance at the school.
Porter outlined three main opportunities the lab will create: driving research and case study development on digital banking; creating internships and field study opportunities at the Toronto-based bank and its digital factory; and hosting hackathons, a digital speaker series, and an annual case competition.
"In this day and age, it's impossible to separate our digital strategy from the bank's overall strategy. Digitizing our customer interfaces, our distribution channels and our internal processes are all critical to delivering on our overall vision to provide a consistently excellent customer experience," Porter said. "We are proud to partner with Ivey to create the Scotiabank Digital Banking Lab and look forward to seeing the outcomes from this exciting new collaboration."
Continued Innovation
Scotia has spent the past year looking for ways to innovate and digitize. The jumping-off place was Kyle McNamara and Michael Zerbs being named co-heads of IT at the bank in June 2015 following the retirement of Kim McKenzie, the previous head of technology. McNamara and Zerbs were profiled by Waters for the September 2015 issue.
In October 2015, the bank announced the creation of a digital factory aimed at developing different innovations and solutions for improving the customer experience. That news was followed by the hiring of Ignacio "Nacho" Deschamps, former chairman and CEO of BBVA Bancomer, in December to serve as a strategic advisor for global digital banking to Porter.
In January 2016, the bank announced it had made a $1.54 million ($2.2 million CAD) investment for the creation of the Scotiabank Centre for Customer Analytics at Smith School of Business at Queen's University, which focus on applied research in customer analytics by university staff, students and bank employees.
Only users who have a paid subscription or are part of a corporate subscription are able to print or copy content.
To access these options, along with all other subscription benefits, please contact info@waterstechnology.com or view our subscription options here: https://subscriptions.waterstechnology.com/subscribe
You are currently unable to print this content. Please contact info@waterstechnology.com to find out more.
You are currently unable to copy this content. Please contact info@waterstechnology.com to find out more.
Copyright Infopro Digital Limited. All rights reserved.
As outlined in our terms and conditions, https://www.infopro-digital.com/terms-and-conditions/subscriptions/ (point 2.4), printing is limited to a single copy.
If you would like to purchase additional rights please email info@waterstechnology.com
Copyright Infopro Digital Limited. All rights reserved.
You may share this content using our article tools. As outlined in our terms and conditions, https://www.infopro-digital.com/terms-and-conditions/subscriptions/ (clause 2.4), an Authorised User may only make one copy of the materials for their own personal use. You must also comply with the restrictions in clause 2.5.
If you would like to purchase additional rights please email info@waterstechnology.com
More on Emerging Technologies
Academic warns of systemic risk from AI-powered trading
Strategies generated by LLMs exhibit “very strange, correlated trading behavior”, says Lopez Lira.
Anthropic partners with S&P, TT to build AI hub, Talos acquires Coin Metrics, and more
The Waters Cooler: Bloomberg adopts agentic AI, DSB report homes in on fairer data costs, and asset managers are coming for your utilities in this week’s news roundup.
The Model Context Protocol brings agents to life—along with risk
Waters Wrap: From chat to infrastructure modernization, Anthropic’s MCP offers a ‘bridge’ to agentic AI, but its early days may prove disillusioning.
BofA ramps up AI deployment, patents
The bank has 1,400 patents in AI and machine learning, either granted or pending, alongside a growing portfolio of 250 models.
BNY CEO updates on ‘platform’ operating model, AI rollout
In its Q2 earnings call, the bank outlined its progress on rolling out its new operating model and ‘Eliza’ internal AI assistant.
NZX outlines plans to bolster fast-growing dark pool
Since launching one year ago, NZX’s dark book has 5.5% of the exchange’s total turnover, and price improvement per trade on average is 11 basis points, but the exchange has more in store.
Waters Wavelength Ep. 325: Octaura’s Brian Bejile
The CEO joins the podcast to talk about the vendor’s modernization efforts in credit and CLOs.
Agentic AI comes to Bloomberg Terminal via Anthropic protocol
The data giant’s ubiquitous terminal has been slowly opening up for years, but its latest enhancement represents a forward leap in what CTO Shawn Edwards calls, “the way we should talk to the world.”