Nationwide consolidates 19 data stores onto Azure platform

Nationwide Building Society completed a project in September 2026 to merge 19 separate data stores into one cloud-based platform running on Microsoft Azure and Azure Databricks. The society says the platform will support its artificial intelligence work and the planned integration of Virgin Money customers.

The consolidation was led by Sri Kanisapakkam, who became chief data and analytics officer in 2023. The programme replaced a 45-year-old customer data system and moved large volumes of customer records onto the new platform. Nationwide serves about 19 million members and has migrated 15 million customers off its former core banking engine. The society is preparing to add around five million Virgin Money customers as part of a proposed takeover first announced in 2024.

Nationwide selected Azure and Azure Databricks to provide a single cloud technology stack with the aim of making data easier to find, understand and trust before it is used by AI models. Sri Kanisapakkam described the requirement plainly: “AI is not magic. It needs to understand how your data is organised and how your data is structured. The data has to be trusted first before you can say your AI is trusted.” The society says the platform creates one unified place for data across the organisation.

Paul Ballard, chief technology officer, outlined the next phase of work, which will use the Microsoft-based platform to create software agents able to interact with Nationwide systems. The building society has also expanded its use of other cloud providers: in January it broadened an agreement with Amazon Web Services to include more services and staff training, and it uses Amazon Connect for contact-centre operations and AI tools aimed at improving member experience.

The consolidation follows earlier technology investments. Nationwide began a long-term IT modernisation programme in 2008 with an initial £1 billion investment. Virgin Money has itself been the subject of integration projects in prior years, including the acquisition of Northern Rock in 2011 and a takeover by the Clydesdale and Yorkshire Banking Group in 2018.

The proposed £2.9 billion acquisition of Virgin Money would add more than 7,000 staff and create the UK’s second-largest mortgage and savings provider, with the Virgin Money brand expected to be phased out over time. Nationwide says the centralised data environment will make it simpler to manage governance and data quality as it rolls out AI-driven services and handles future customer migrations.