la Caixa wins "The Asian Banker" Award for the Best Branch Innovation

• A panel of judges, made up of international executives from the banking sector, recognized the bank's specialisation model based on customer needs.

"la Caixa" has won the 2012 Award for the Best Branch Innovation (Global Best Practice Winner), organised by The Asian Banker. The bank, of which Isidro Fainé is the Chairman and Juan María Nin is Deputy Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, was included in an international best practices shortlist, put together annually and exclusively for The Asian Banker by a team of financial sector executives.

The judges recognized "la Caixa"'s commitment to innovation in its commercial network, and particularly its implementation of a management model based on customer needs.
 
"la Caixa" began developing its segment specialization model in 2007, creating specialized services for personal banking, private banking, SMEs and corporate banking. The strategy helped reinforce "la Caixa"'s leading position in retail banking. "la Caixa" currently has 10.4 million customers.

This recognition from The Asian Banker, a specialist in banking sector analysis based in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Peking and Dubai, follows other international awards that "la Caixa" has won for its innovation strategy and excellence in customer service.

Such awards include recognition as the world's most innovative bank at the Global Banking innovation Awards in Chicago (USA), run by the Bank Administration Institute and Finacle. In 2011 "la Caixa" also won the UK's Banking Technology Award for its mobile payment system, as well as the Publi-News Award for its international assistance program provided to CaixaProtect Emergency card customers and for designing the world's first contactless ATM.