In a briefing to media and analysts, CBA chiefs lined up to sing the praises of the bank's new SAP for Banking platform, saying the programme would put it three to five years ahead of other banks in the region.

At its half-yearly results presentation in February, the bank announced that it would be extending the project by a year, and upped its spending forecast to $1.1 billion, almost double its original estimates of $580 million.

CBA said that "areas of added complexity" had pushed the timeframe back, as the project sought to replace 40-year old siloed systems with an integrated real-time platform.

Despite the cost over-run, the bank achieved a significant milestone this year with the successful national launch of retail saving and transaction account functionality to the new system. CBA now has over 11 million accounts and over $100 billion in balances operating on the SAP platform with improved functionality such as instant account opening and immediate product switching capabilities.

CBA chief information officer Michael Harte says: "While legacy systems are inherent in all large financial institutions, few have had the courage to challenge and execute the necessary changes. Our core banking modernisation will place us well ahead of our competitors. The new architecture behind the SAP platform gives us the power to treat IT as a utility."

Speaking at yesterday's briefing, CBA chief executive Ralph Norris said the modernisation programme will reduce the bank's time to market for new products from months to days.

CIO Harte added that the bank has held talks with third party PFM platform providers, as it looks to transfer the benefits of real-time account processing from the core into the hands of customers.

"We would like to be in a position to be able to help people with cash management, help people with budgeting, help people ensure they've got the right balances in the right accounts . . . to ensure they've got maximum value and that's what having all those transaction records and account history (in real-time) will help us do," Harte told the Australian in post-meeting brief. "Over time we'll be able to offer people discounts and points for loyalty with much greater efficiency."

Harte dismissed the efforts of rival National Australia Bank, which has initiated its own core banking overhaul programme by first introducing the technology at its Ubank subsidiary. He likened the NAB project to the experience of Qantas' JetStar subsidiary, effectively creating a functionally distinct bank within a bank.