As the year 2014 comes to a close, I wanted to share some of my professional reflections and take the opportunity to send you all my very best wishes for a wonderful New Year.

What a year it was - Financial services in a rollercoaster of changing business models, increasing regulatory pressure and never ending quest for raising customer satisfaction and profitability. Having worked most of the year at @Thomson Reuters , and recently joined @Luxoft to increase their book of business in EMEA, i have witnessed the tide starting to turn and seeing growth in IT spending again. I am seeing an increased focus on building agile business models and transparent linkage of front, middle and back office systems to turn regulatory compliance into a competitive advantage.

New entrants start to lure peripheral banking activities away from traditional banks and take early adopter market share on social and p2p lending, game virtual and crypto currencies entering the real world of payments and a massive digitalization of the bank's service models.
Increased regulatory pressure and a record breaking amount of fines have now put IT innovation and overhaul of legacy systems firmly at the executive table. Insightful, timely and actionable data spanning front, middle and back office systems is critical for banking executives now and for the years to come.
2015 - here we come. With topics on the radar like balance sheet efficiency, mobile payments, compliance and risk management and cyber security, I have no illusion that it will mean a quiet Saturday afternoon sailing trip. We are ready for it.

I am thankful for the business opportunities and conversations we have had in 2014 and wish you and your loved ones a very happy 2015.