Executive Council

Manish Maakan is Chief Executive Officer of  iGTB, the global transaction banking division of Intellect Design Arena Limited, based in iGTB’s headquarters in London. He has occupied the role since its formation in May 2013.

Manish has passionately built award-winning products led by high-performing innovation teams to enable his vision of Contextual Banking – ensuring banks genuinely help their customers in real time, bringing the same level of contextual awareness and support consumers experience in other field.

During the last seven years, Manish has led iGTB to being the most-preferred partner of choice for Digital Transaction Banking transformation programs globally. iGTB is currently  trusted by 88 of the best global Corporate Banks across 55 countries, and is rated # 1 in different categories by 12 analysts and most recently as # 1 in Wholesale Banking-Transaction Banking  by IBS.

Manish joined Polaris FT in 2007 and led its Product business.   The product was called Intellect, and that name gave birth to our current organisation’s name. He was a key architect in designing the growth strategy, building the business and getting the team in place in its founding years till it reached $ 75M revenue.

Manish previously served in key leadership roles, leading transformations as CIO at GE Money, setting up the Technology centre for Whirlpool’s India business, and as a management consultant at E&Y, building financial solutions for EMI Records, building on his earlier experience working as a technologist in IBM and several other IT companies in the US.

Manish’s impressive career spans nearly three decades .  He brings a differentiated design-thinking approach to innovation, growth and complexity reduction in business. He has also been a recipient of many prestigious awards during his career.  Always softly spoken, Manish routinely reframes problems, expands his team’s thinking and keeps focus on achievement of ambitious goals.

He has been inspired by two individuals who, as he puts it, “dared to dream big!” in the mid-Eighties: Jack Welch and Michael Jordan.  Their mantras combine to sum up Manish’s guiding professional and emotional lodestones:

• Be number one or number two – or get out of the business!
• I believe I can fly!