Core banking
Why the build vs. buy question is almost always asked too late
A short essay on vendor selection timing in UK retail banking, and the cost of starting the conversation after the budget has already been shaped.
ReadIndependent technology advisory
Most banks start their vendor search too late and finish it too fast.
Strawpath helps financial firms evaluate, select and monitor key technology providers, with the rigour that high-value vendor decisions require.
Based on decades of experience across
Engagement details held under standard confidentiality terms.
What we do
The decision starts before the RFP.
Strawpath helps you answer the build, buy or outsource question first, then, if buying is the right path, guides you from market scan to vendor selection to ongoing monitoring. Including AI platform assessment and vendor AI roadmap evaluation.
- 00Build / Buy / Outsource analysis
- 01Market scan
- 02Shortlisting & evaluation
- 03Vendor health monitoring
Why Strawpath
Independent, experienced, and equipped from the first conversation.
Decades inside the institutions you're buying for
Over 25 years across Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Barclays, Mastercard, Smart Pension and Charity Bank. We've sat on your side of the table, in your kind of meeting, against your kind of deadline.
A foot in the future
Active advisors and investors in the fintechs and infrastructure startups reshaping the technology landscape. We see what's coming, not just what's already on the analyst grid.
Frameworks that move you from week one
Structured assessment methods, RFP scaffolding and decision tooling refined across dozens of engagements. No blank pages, no slow starts, no rediscovering first principles on your time.
Proprietary intelligence on vendors and trends
Continuously maintained data on platform capabilities, pricing patterns, implementation track records and where the market is genuinely heading.
"Every vendor now has an AI story. Not all of them have an AI capability."
A poorly structured vendor shortlist costs more than a bad RFP. Banks routinely enter formal vendor selection processes with the wrong vendors in the room, not because of poor judgment, but because the market scan happened too quickly, or didn't happen at all. Analyst subscriptions tell you who the vendors are. They don't tell you which ones are right for your architecture, your regulatory posture, or your team's implementation capacity.
Adjacent engagements
Beyond vendor selection.
Two further bodies of work that often sit alongside, or upstream of, a vendor selection.
Strategy
Tech strategy & architecture
Independent architecture review and roadmap work for institutions navigating legacy estate decisions. Short-form, fixed-scope engagements with documented deliverables.
How we workIntelligence
Vendor intelligence
For every technology vendor we assess, we build a structured profile across five dimensions: functional capability, technical architecture, financial health, live client implementations, and ecosystem partnerships.
Explore the frameworkSectors
Retail banking
Vendor assessment for legacy core banking replacement, payments modernisation and CRM consolidation, sharpened by FCA third-party reporting obligations.
Pensions
Administration platform reviews, master-trust scale decisions and regulatory-driven vendor reviews for trustees and in-house teams.
Insights
Vendor AI
How to tell a vendor AI roadmap from a vendor AI story
Five architectural signals that distinguish a genuine AI capability from a marketing response to market pressure.
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