Roadmap for simplification of enterprise architecture at financial institutions

Enterprise architectures at the best of financial institutions are not necessarily a result of choice, but are patch work quilts developed over time, sometimes decades, with multitude of technologies, while responding to business needs at any given point in time. The various lines of business at financial institutions run in silos creating unwanted complexity and duplication. Mergers & acquisitions add to the complexity too making the enterprise architecture into an ungainly elephant that doesn't have enough strength to chug on yet cannot be allowed to collapse. Cost, difficult maintenance, lack of agility, slow time to market and other considerations require the enterprise architectures at financial institutions be simplified. We present here a simplification framework based on system engineering principles that will look at all dimensions that matter in a financial institution and help in creating an effective roadmap to simplification of enterprise architecture at any financial institution thereby helping drive down the price of financial services and improve financial inclusion of the hitherto unbanked.