Mashreq pilots IBM’s coding AI, with reported time savings of up to 70%

Mashreq is piloting AI software engineering tools to speed up the work of connecting its banking systems and diagnosing problems. In its October 12, 2026 announcement, IBM said early use of IBM Bob reduced integration design and troubleshooting time by up to 60–70%. The results concern engineering work, not faster payment processing.

The banking backbone behind the pilot

The Dubai-headquartered bank already operates an integration platform linking channels, applications, partners and countries. It supports digital banking, instant payments, cross-border transactions and operations across multiple countries. According to IBM, that platform processes an average of 650 transactions per second across digital channels, payments and enterprise systems.

Mashreq is working with IBM and GBM to modernize that foundation. The work uses IBM’s integration software, Red Hat OpenShift and Confluent technology to support secure connections and real-time data movement. The Bob pilot sits within this engineering environment, rather than replacing the platform that runs the bank’s connected services.

IBM Bob is IBM’s AI-powered software engineering platform. Mashreq is exploring its use from solution design and planning through development, code review and troubleshooting in production—the systems already in operation. The stated aim is to help engineers deliver software and resolve issues more quickly, while freeing time for higher-value work.

IBM said activities that previously required two to three hours of manual effort were completed within minutes during the pilot. That task-level example accompanies the broader reported reduction in design and troubleshooting time. The announcement does not specify the number of tasks tested or explain how the percentage reduction was measured.

As we continue to advance our digital-first strategy, we are investing in technologies that help our engineering teams move faster while maintaining the resilience and quality our customers expect,

Mohamed Abdel Razek, Group Head of Technology, Transformation and Information, Mashreq

Giving agents the bank’s engineering context

The pilot is supported by IBM Context Forge, based on the Model Context Protocol, or MCP. Mashreq uses it to coordinate agents across integration work and give them secure access to the enterprise information engineers rely on. The knowledge supplied is specific to the bank’s systems, not just general software-development guidance.

• Integration knowledge and API specifications: information about the bank’s connections and the interfaces software uses to communicate.
• Architecture standards: the engineering rules and designs that guide how its systems fit together.
• Operational context: information about the systems engineers are supporting, alongside the specifications used to build them.

Through a secure gateway, Mashreq manages about 4,000 requests a month from AI agents to connected digital banking, payments and enterprise systems. IBM describes this setup as supporting design decisions, code reviews, troubleshooting and operational analysis. The request count measures agent activity through that gateway; it is separate from the banking platform’s transaction throughput.

Local models remain a possible next step

Mashreq is also exploring a future on-premises deployment of Bob for mission-critical uses. That would involve access to locally hosted models where data-residency and regulatory requirements call for them. IBM presents this as a potential deployment direction, not as a completed installation or a decision to move every engineering task onto local infrastructure.

The bank is evaluating a wider role for these capabilities in software engineering and operations across the enterprise, Abdel Razek said. For now, the disclosed work remains a pilot focused on helping engineering teams. Broader adoption and the possible locally hosted configuration are next steps under consideration, rather than outcomes established by the early time-saving figures.