Last update: 18/04/2024

The platform will boost customer experience when banking with Santander while bringing significant efficiencies through cutting-edge end-to-end automation.

1. What is Gravity? 

Gravity is Santander’s in-house digital cloud-native core banking platform and a software that enables the migration of the core banking system from mainframe to the cloud. Gravity is being implemented worldwide to help Santander become a fully digital company and it will be completed between the end of 2024 and the first half of 2025.

2. Why is Gravity so innovative? 

To modernize legacy mainframes, Gravity’s software allows parallel processing, meaning Santander can simultaneously run workloads on its existing core banking mainframe and on the cloud. This mainframe migration solution has permitted us to perform real-time testing with no disruption to its businesses. 

Santander has also reduced the bank’s energy consumption from its IT infrastructure by 70%, contributing to its responsible banking targets.

Dirk Marzluf, Chief Operating and Technology Officer at Banco Santander, explains Gravity

3. What does this mean for Santander customers? 

By having a digitized core banking, we can serve customers better and more efficiently. This transformation is allowing easier and faster access to data, more simplicity and faster time-to market, making it possible to deliver new capabilities for customers in hours, instead of days or weeks, and more frequent app updates. 

Santander is the first major bank in the world to digitalize its core banking with its own software. We have already migrated more than 90% of our IT infrastructure to the cloud so we can offer the best service to our customers.

4. How are the teams at Santander performing?  

Santander’s successful cloud-native core banking platform is built upon world-class capabilities thanks to the knowledge transfer of a large team of IT professionals, some of whom created the legacy system 20 years ago and are now moving it to the cloud, as well as young developers and engineers. 

Gravity gives Santander’s 16,500 software developers and engineers a modern, high-performing environment to create customer-centric applications, and also increases the bank’s ability to attract top talent.

5. What does core banking mean in the banking industry? 

It is the most critical part of a bank’s IT infrastructure and is where the main financial transactions, such as money transfers, deposits or loans are processed. At the completion of the program, more than 1 trillion technical executions will be managed every year by the Gravity platform within Santander’s systems.

6. What is next in Santander’s digital transformation? 

As part of Santander’s innovation initiatives, the bank is also in the middle of a transformation to bring its 164 million customers onto a common operating model supported by a cutting-edge technology platform. This project, named One Transformation, is based on proven group operating models and proprietary technology like Gravity. 

Our One Transformation initiative is based on creating a common operating and business model for retail and commercial banking that will boost our productivity, cut service costs, and empower us to improve customer experience. It will enable our in-branch teams to dedicate more time to our customers and offer them the personal service they demand on all channels.

7 How has Google used Gravity? 

Google announced, in October 2022, that it would be commercializing a service to help other companies transition from mainframe to cloud called Dual Run. Google Cloud built Dual Run, a mainframe migration service leveraging Gravity, which was developed on top of Santander’s technology.