AI Agents Offer Banking Modernization Without Replacements
Financial institutions can now integrate automation over existing legacy cores to reduce manual process bottlenecks.
Updated on Oct. 22, 2026 in Financial Services
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Sutherland and FlowX.AI have partnered to deploy artificial intelligence agents that integrate with existing banking core systems. The initiative aims to automate complex workflows like lending and anti-money laundering checks for financial institutions across North America and Europe.
Why it matters
Financial institutions often struggle to modernize due to costly, high-risk migrations of legacy systems that can be up to 40 years old. This partnership offers a way to improve operational efficiency without replacing the underlying core infrastructure.
Industry surveys show 52% of financial institutions view legacy technology and 53% view manual-intensive processes as significant hurdles to modernization. FlowX.AI provides over 220 prebuilt AI agents to help firms bypass the need for full core system replacements.
The players
Sutherland
A global process transformation firm that designs and manages digital workflows and AI integration for regulated industries.
FlowX.AI
A technology provider specializing in AI agent orchestration and prebuilt automation tools for financial services infrastructure.
The details
Sutherland builds and configures AI agents to interact with a client's existing software stack, data, and legacy cores. The agents access these systems via APIs, computer use, or the Model Context Protocol, allowing institutions to automate tasks such as mortgage underwriting, account opening, and customer retention. This approach avoids the high cost and disruption typically associated with replacing legacy infrastructure.
Timeline
October 19, 2026: Sutherland and FlowX.AI announced their partnership.
August 2026: Maximum and 10x Banking secured significant venture capital funding.
September 2026: Kastle raised $24 million in Series A funding.
May 2026: Mambu enabled Model Context Protocol connections for agent operations.
2024: Kansas City Federal Reserve researchers documented challenges with legacy banking systems.
Market Landscape
This partnership addresses the persistent architectural constraints identified in the 2024 Kansas City Federal Reserve report on legacy banking systems. It follows a wave of capital investment in 2026 by fintechs like 10x Banking and Kastle, all targeting the modernization of aging financial cores.
Operators in banking and insurance should evaluate if their current manual workflows can be bypassed by AI agent integration rather than a complete core system overhaul. When assessing these tools, factor in the security implications of providing third-party agents access to legacy data via APIs.
The takeaway
Financial institutions can now address efficiency gaps by layering automation over legacy systems rather than pursuing risky full-scale core migrations. Evaluate your current lending or onboarding workflows to identify manual handoffs that could be reduced by prebuilt agent integrations.
Further reading
For broader trends in infrastructure modernization, see the Financial Services section.
Source note: This article includes information reported by PYMNTS.
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