First Niagara hires new chief information officer

First Niagara Financial Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: FNFG) named a new senior vice president and chief information officer this week.

The Buffalo–based banking company named Inder Koul to the posts Wednesday. He is now responsible for leading the development and implementation of all information technology strategy and initiatives at First Niagara.

“Inder is a business-minded CIO with proven leadership skills that align extremely well with our future plans,” Gary Crosby, chief operating officer, said in a news release. “As we continue to build and enhance a comprehensive suite of products and services for our customers in all lines of business, technology is a key enabler of that strategy.”

Koul joins First Niagara from Huntington Bancshares, Inc., where he served as chief information officer for the bank’s commercial, auto finance, and corporate services groups, and as the director of the enterprise project management office.

First Niagara Bank has 430 branches, $36 billion in assets, and 6,000 employees in upstate New York, Pennsylvania, Connecticut, and Massachusetts.

First Niagara Bank is number four in the Syracuse metro area deposit market with 21 branches, more than $808 million in deposits, and a deposit market share of more than 7.5 percent, according to the latest statistics from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. First Niagara is also number four in the Utica–Rome market with nine branches, $405.9 million in deposits, and a market share of about 11 percent.

The bank is number two in the Binghamton market with 10 branches, $342.5 million in deposits, and a market share of 12.8 percent.

Contact Tampone at ktampone@cnybj.com