Innovation in Banking Is No Longer About Ideas — It’s About Execution

Insights from Yorick Naeff, Head of Innovation at ABN AMRO Bank, at the European Digital Finance Conference in Amsterdam — March 5, 2025

At the European Digital Finance Conference in Amsterdam, Yorick Naeff delivered a clear and timely message: innovation in banking is no longer about ideas or experimentation — it is about execution and measurable impact.

Drawing on his experience as founder of BUX and now leading innovation within a major European bank, Naeff outlined how the definition — and practice — of innovation is rapidly evolving under the influence of AI, digital assets, and changing customer behaviour.

FROM BUZZWORD TO BUSINESS IMPACT

Naeff began by challenging a fundamental assumption: that everyone understands what ‘innovation’ actually means. In many organisations, innovation remains abstract — associated with labs, pilots, and ‘the next big thing.’ That approach, he argued, is increasingly disconnected from reality.

“If you ask 100 people what innovation is, you’ll get 100 different answers.“

He framed innovation along two distinct paths: exploratory innovation, which involves building entirely new products or platforms, and execution-driven innovation, which focuses on solving real problems that directly improve business performance. His conclusion was unambiguous:

“In today’s environment, especially in financial services, we should focus on making impact and executing.“

This marks a shift away from innovation theatre toward innovation as disciplined delivery — where business cases, efficiency gains, and customer outcomes take priority over experimentation alone.

AI AS THE CATALYST FOR EXECUTION

Rather than positioning AI as a futuristic concept, Naeff framed it as a practical tool for execution at scale. Banks today face two strategic choices when deploying AI: rebuilding processes from the ground up with AI at the core, or applying AI incrementally to solve specific problems that collectively drive significant impact.

While both paths have merit, Naeff emphasised the power of the second approach — particularly in large, complex institutions.

“Individually, these improvements may seem small. But together, they move the needle significantly.”

This aligns with a broader industry trend: AI as an operational layer, not just a strategic ambition.

THE RISE OF AGENTIC AI: A STRUCTURAL SHIFT

The most forward-looking part of Naeff’s presentation focused on agentic AI — a development he sees as fundamentally reshaping banking. He outlined the evolution of AI in financial services across four stages:

• Human-to-human interaction (traditional banking)
• Human-to-system automation (rule-based workflows, early chatbots)
• Generative AI (natural language understanding and content generation)
• Agentic AI (autonomous systems that act, decide, and execute)

Unlike earlier systems, agentic agents can make decisions, execute tasks end-to-end, and interact with other systems — and increasingly, with other agents. This is not theoretical. Early forms of agentic systems are already live, particularly in software development and operational processes.

FROM CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIPS TO AGENT-TO-AGENT BANKING

Perhaps the most disruptive insight from the session was this: the future of banking may not be human-to-bank — but agent-to-bank. Customers are already using AI to guide decisions in healthcare, finance, and daily life. Banking will follow the same pattern.

In this emerging model, customers deploy personal AI agents that interact directly with banks, with decisions — such as where to place funds — optimised automatically. Traditional differentiators like brand, trust, and relationship management may become less relevant in machine-driven interactions. Instead, competition shifts toward:

• Real-time performance
• Data accessibility through frameworks such as FIDA
• System interoperability
• Algorithmic competitiveness

“Agents will decide where money goes — potentially on a daily basis.”

The strategic response? Banks must build their own agents capable of interacting within this ecosystem — effectively creating agent-to-agent networks.

AI ACROSS THE ENTIRE BANKING VALUE CHAIN

Beyond customer interaction, Naeff highlighted how AI is already transforming every layer of banking. In customer operations, end-to-end automation is becoming reality — simple requests such as replacing a lost bank card can now be fully handled by AI without human intervention. In the back office, process optimisation is accelerating through intelligent automation and decisioning systems.

In IT and development, agentic AI is already writing, testing, and improving code, reshaping how software is built. And at the employee level, roles are evolving from execution to orchestration: staff increasingly manage and guide AI systems, rather than perform tasks directly.

BEYOND AI: THE CONVERGENCE EFFECT

While AI dominated the narrative, Naeff emphasised that the real disruption lies in convergence. Three forces in particular are combining to reshape banking: AI driving automation, decision-making, and productivity; embedded finance integrating financial services into non-banking platforms; and digital assets and tokenisation enabling instant settlement, borderless transactions, and 24/7 financial infrastructure.

” There is already technology that can settle transactions instantly — borderless, 24/7, at low cost.”

This convergence challenges core banking assumptions — particularly around settlement cycles, infrastructure, and value chains.

A NEW MANDATE FOR BANKING LEADERS

Naeff’s message was ultimately a call to action. Innovation can no longer be isolated in labs, detached from business outcomes, or focused solely on long-term bets. Instead, it must be embedded in execution, measured by impact, scaled through AI, and aligned with structural industry shifts.

• Embedded in execution
• Measured by impact
• Scaled through AI
• Aligned with structural industry shifts

“I hope I got you thinking about what innovation and disruption are on the horizon.”

If his message lands, banking leaders will rethink not just their innovation strategies — but the very foundations of how banks operate in an AI-driven world.

Published by The Banking 50 · European Digital Finance Conference, Amsterdam