Swedbank has appointed Catrin Fransson as new head of Swedish banking (retail), who currently holds the position as head of customer offerings and products as well as CEO of Swedbank Mortgage. Swedbank has created a new business area, group business support, which will gather all production within one unit to maximize the production efficiency.
Ms Fransson will take up her new position on May 1, 2010. She has worked for the bank since 1987 and has held a various positions including head of the northern region and head of Swedbank´s branch office in southern Stockholm.
She has also worked for more than 10 years within Swedbank markets with among other things large corporations and equity analysis. Ms Fransson also sits on the board of Swedbank´s subsidiaries Swedbank Finans and Swedbank Forsakring.
Michael Wolf, CEO of Swedbank, said: “With Ms Fransson as new head of retail, we get a manager with substantial experience of Swedbank and all parts of our retail business. I am convinced that she in a great way will carry on our long heritage as the leading Swedish bank for the many private individuals and the small enterprises.”
The new group business support unit will be responsible for the bank’s products and production and will also include the current Group IT, group cards, the product areas from the Swedish product unit customer offerings and products as well as the corresponding unit in the Baltic countries, business development division, and other areas.
Group business support will also have a functional responsibility for production within the business area large corporates and institutions as well as within the subsidiary Swedbank Robur. However, the new organization will be implemented during autumn 2010.
The bank has appointed Mikael Bjorknert as head of group business support. He comes from a position as head of global transaction services at SEB. He will take up his new position on August 1, 2010.
Mr Mikael has many years of experience from a various international positions within SEB, including head of securities services and commercial banking. He has served on a number of internal boards within SEB and also sits on external boards such as the Nasdaq OMX Nordic´s board of directors.
The current head of group IT, Christer Cragnell, also holds the position as Swedbank´s chief information officer (CIO). He will be responsible for IT strategy and will continue to report to Swedbank´s CEO Michael Wolf.
Moreover, Mr Fransson and Mr Bjorknert will be members of Swedbank’s senior management and group executive committee.
Mr Wolf said: “With the creation of group business support, we are laying the last piece of the puzzle in the reorganization of Swedbank. We now have an organization in place with clear responsibilities: The retail units in Sweden and in the Baltic countries will focus on building long-term customer relationships through strong, cost-efficient customer offerings while large corporate and institutions will focus on gathering the expertise and strengthening the customer offering as well as capital efficiency and group business support will ensure the operational excellence of our production.
“With Mr Bjorknert, we get a head of group business support with long and extensive experience of administrative business processes within the banking sector, and I feel very comfortable that we now have a new team in place that going forward will deliver on the goals that we have set for our operations.”