From the CIO’s View: Capital One’s Rob Alexander Talks Tech Predictions for 2017

We sat down with Capital One CIO Rob Alexander at the AWS re:Invent conference in Las Vegas and asked him about the news Capital One and Amazon announced at the conference and about his top tech priorities for the year ahead.

Q. Capital One & Amazon announced news at re:Invent — can you talk a little bit about that?

A. Capital One announced that we are taking a cloud first approach to all development, with AWS as our predominant supplier for cloud infrastructure services. We really see this as a key component of our modern technology approach as a company. The AWS Cloud enables fast, efficient development and deployment of software and allows our teams to focus on what we do best — building great software and delivering innovative experiences to our customers.

Q. What’s your top tech priority for 2017?

A. Recruiting and retaining talent is top of mind for me. It’s not enough to be 10 percent better than the next bank. We have to move fast, build our own software and leverage data and analytics to build better customer experiences — and that all starts with our talent. We have hired thousands of engineers and have massive demand for skilled and creative software engineers, data engineers, security engineers, cloud engineers and others to join our collaborative and fast-paced technology team.

Q. How is banking going to change in the future and what role does technology play in that?

A. Technology is going to play a central role in how people bank in the future, as banking becomes more real-time, digital and better able to anticipate customer needs. To win as digital redefines banking and to deliver that great digital experience for our customers, we know we need to build the talent and capabilities of a leading technology company.

Q. Top tech predictions for 2017?

A. I expect we’ll continue to see some really interesting advancements in the future of machine learning and applications across industries that unlock breakthrough customer experiences. It’s an area we’re exploring at Capital One — how can we better harness data and information responsibly and in new and powerful ways to help our customers with their financial lives.

Q. As we wind down the year, any reflections from 2016 that you’d like to share?

A. I’m incredibly grateful for the talented people I get to work with every day. Whether we were building new software for our customers or building our booth at the Grace Hopper Celebration of Women in Computing, I was inspired by the amount of passion and talent our people invested in creating the best possible experience possible. I’m excited to see what we can accomplish together in 2017.

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