Digital Banker of the Year

Niti Badarinath is pushing new mobile banking and mobile wallet concepts to market at U.S. Bank with a sense of urgency: he knows customers want more.

Under Roy Malone's direction, Golden Pacific Bancorp last year introduced an online lending platform that vastly speeds up the approval process for borrowers seeking Small Business Administration loans ranging from $5,000 to $150,000.

An international hackathon is helping Jorge Ruiz, Citibank's head of business development and digital banking for Latin America, keep the bank's apps fresh.

Peter Setaro, the chief information officer for First National Bank of the Gulf Coast, is stocking branches with free wifi and Kindles for customers to use.

Jim Smith, head of the digital channels group at Wells Fargo, recently set up an internal lab to study uses of data science to drive customer experience, prevent fraud and develop customer insights.

Most banks say they listen to the customer, but Jim Simpson at City Bank Texas directly studies comments made in call centers and branches for clues to the next mobile banking app features.

David Watson has overseen the development of more than 160 apps for corporate customers, which helped make him one of BTN’s Digital Banker of the Year honorees.

Creating a more efficient way to do the same old thing isn't enough, says David Gerbino. Banks need to reconstruct some of their basic deposit products to truly innovate.

The rising importance of self-service banking by mobile device and PC has elevated the careers of executives overseeing digital channels.