Introduction
MUFG Union Bank is a full-service financial institution providing corporate, commercial, retail banking, and wealth management services across the United States. Facing increasing regulatory pressure, changing business demands, and growing data complexity, the bank set out to treat data as a true corporate asset. WhereScape RED became a cornerstone of this transformation: enabling agile, automated development of trusted, business-critical data marts in weeks rather than months.
Pre-WhereScape Challenges
- Fragmented reporting landscape: A patchwork of point solutions made consistent reporting and analytics difficult to manage.
- Slow traditional development: Conventional data warehouse projects took months, delaying time-to-value.
- Rigid architectures: Existing approaches produced brittle systems that were difficult to change or scale.
- Compliance pressure: Regulatory reporting required certified, consistent data with full lineage and documentation.
Why WhereScape?
Union Bank needed a flexible, automated approach to data warehouse and data mart development that could deliver rapid results without sacrificing governance. WhereScape RED offered agile development, metadata-driven automation, and native optimisation for both SQL Server and Greenplum: allowing IT and business teams to collaborate while dramatically accelerating delivery.
“WhereScape RED is providing Union Bank a very powerful, repeatable, low-cost way to develop in parallel and with agility.”
– Ryan Fenner, VP, Data Solutions Architect, MUFG Union Bank
The Solution
Parallel Development Strategy
Union Bank split its data initiatives into parallel tracks, one focused on the enterprise Greenplum data warehouse, the other delivering immediate business value through departmental data marts on SQL Server.
Automated Data Mart Delivery
WhereScape RED was used to rapidly scope, prototype and build a complex consumer-lending data mart, integrating servicing and origination data with minimal manual effort.
Metadata-Driven Architecture
RED automatically generated dimensions, aggregates, semantic layers and documentation – ensuring consistency, reuse and regulatory compliance from day one.
Platform-Independent Design
WhereScape generated optimised SQL for both SQL Server and Greenplum, allowing data marts to be reprovisioned and migrated with minimal additional effort.
“Union Bank used WhereScape RED to rapidly scope, prototype, and build out its business facing data mart from source systems in less than eight weeks. Using conventional development methods would have required six to eight months.”
– Ryan Fenner, VP, Data Solutions Architect, MUFG Union Bank
Results
🚀 Dramatically Faster Time-to-Value
- Development cycles are reduced from months to weeks.
- Business users receive insight far earlier in the project lifecycle.
- Faster response to changing business priorities.
🚀 Improved Compliance and Governance
- Automated metadata management and data lineage.
- Consistent, certified data for regulatory reporting.
- Clear documentation generated and maintained automatically.
🚀 Stronger IT–Business Collaboration
- Business stakeholders collaborate throughout design.
- Prototypes replace static requirements documents.
- Higher satisfaction and adoption across business units.
🚀 Scalable, Repeatable Delivery Model
- Proven approach reused across departments.
- Marketing, capital markets, credit risk and call centre teams queued next.
- Lower cost per solution with consistent quality.
Data as a Strategic Asset
Union Bank’s leadership recognised that treating data as an afterthought was no longer sustainable. By investing in a governed, enterprise-aligned data architecture supported by automation, the bank laid the foundation for long-term analytics maturity and regulatory confidence.
Bringing ‘Spreadmarts’ Into the Fold
WhereScape RED made it possible to integrate valuable but isolated data sets – including analyst-managed spreadsheets and custom tables – into governed data marts, increasing visibility while reducing operational risk.
Future-Proofing the Architecture
Using WhereScape RED, Union Bank can seamlessly migrate data marts from SQL Server into its enterprise Greenplum warehouse. Reprovisioning requires minimal effort, ensuring today’s solutions align with tomorrow’s architecture.
A Cultural Shift Toward Agility
The collaborative, iterative development model enabled by WhereScape RED changed how IT and the business work together. Subject-matter experts now sit alongside data architects, accelerating understanding, trust and outcomes.
