CEC Bank modernizes its IT network: innovative software-controlled internal data network solution

CEC Bank, the financial institution with the longest tradition and the largest territorial network in Romania, modernizes its internal data infrastructure using the best technology available on the market: software management of data traffic throughout the network – Software Defined Wide Area Network.

The internal data networks play an essential role in the bank’s activity and in providing banking services to the public: through the internal network, the information is transferred between the units and at the Central level – for banking operations, loans, etc. In the last year, the needs at the bank level have increased exponentially in the context of launching ambitious digitization projects – electronic document management system, virtual store for accessing banking services, but also in the context of implementing a hybrid working model in internal teams.

In the last year, CEC Bank has witnessed a doubling of the number of e-mails, up to 8 million, to 150,000 online meetings on Teams and a 70% increase in the number of documents stored in the internal network. In this context, the bank needed to rapidly modernize its IT infrastructure. In less than five months, the SD-WAN data traffic software management system was implemented in over 80% of CEC Bank locations – the largest banking network in Romania, with over 1,000 units. Thanks to the dynamic allocation of communication bands, it was possible to increase the network capacity up to 20 times, but also the implementation of modern IT security solutions, cloud and Office 365.

The SD-WAN approach allowed the modernization of the infrastructure in record time and at low cost, through the centralized, remote configuration of the entire network, through software, compared to the traditional approach, in which data exchange through the internal network was ensured by manual configuration. equipment and connections.