Silos or Centralization

Financial Times reports that Citigroup has made significant savings, moving from silos to centralized computing:

The group has tended to operate as a collection of “silos” without focusing on the opportunities to share costs, he argues.

However, significant savings have been made in recent years.

The introduction of central computerised purchasing is saving more than $500m a year and rationalisation of information technology is expected to yield about $2bn a year.

Mr Prince has made clear he is expecting Mr Druskin to come up with big structural savings rather than more trimming.

“We’re not looking for him to squeeze the rock in terms of magazine subscriptions or black cars,” he told analysts in December.