Data Mesh for Financial Service Providers
Name
Anette Maria Kuklane
Abstract
The volume of data and its generation rate are increasing at unprecedented levels each year. Most organizations depend on centralized architectures for analytical data, which struggle to cope with the growing demands for data. In response, data mesh has emerged as a new architectural approach that decentralizes data management into domains to address the limitations of centralized data architectures. Due to the novelty of data mesh, there is a lack of research on its necessity and applicability in the financial services sector. This thesis sought to explore the current data management practices of financial service providers and how these practices might limit the achievement of business needs and objectives. Moreover, it aimed to investigate how data mesh can be implemented within the financial services sector, focusing on defining data domains and exploring the value data mesh could provide. For this, semi-structured interviews were conducted with ten industry specialists and analyzed using the thematic analysis method. The study found that the impact of data management practices on business objectives depends on how long they have been in place and the variety of products offered. Traditional banks faced more limitations compared to challenger banks and FinTechs. Similarly, the adoption of a data mesh architecture could be particularly valuable for larger and more established institutions, such as traditional banks. However, while other financial organizations may see less immediate value, early adoption could be beneficial for future scaling. Additionally, the findings indicated that adopting even some of the data mesh principles, such as decentralized data ownership and governance, could benefit financial organizations. Although there seems to be no clear way of how to define the data domains, the findings suggested a product or process-oriented approach that aligns with business domains as well as highlighted that certain data sets should be centralized.
Graduation Thesis language
English
Graduation Thesis type
Master - Software Engineering
Supervisor(s)
Fredrik Payman Milani
Defence year
2024