As its preferred cloud platform provider, Microsoft will help the bank make its vision for virtual banking, next-generation payments, open banking and banking-as-a-service a reality.
Standard Chartered has established a three-year strategic partnership with Microsoft to accelerate its digital transformation through a cloud-first strategy, according to an announcement on Tuesday.
As part of the partnership, Standard Chartered will adopt Microsoft Azure as its preferred cloud platform to meet its need for resilient data centers and cloud services with the highest security and regulatory standards. The bank will also leverage Microsoft’s artificial intelligence (AI) and analytics capabilities to automate banking processes and deliver hyper-personalization of its products and experiences for customers, and its employees globally will also adopt Microsoft’s collaboration, office productivity and document management tools to advance digital workplace transformation.
«The pandemic has shone a spotlight on the need for businesses and banks to be resilient from a risk mitigation, cost and security perspective. With the increasing trend of an always-on digital economy, commercial and consumer clients are looking for applications and services that empower them to do online banking from anywhere, flexibly and efficiently,» Bhupendra Warathe, chief technology officer, cloud transformation at Standard Chartered, said about the bank's digital-first strategy.
Digital-First
The bank's core banking and trading systems and new digital ventures such as virtual banking and banking as-a-service, will be cloud-based by 2025, and it will also adopt a cloud-first principle for all new software developments and major enhancements, the announcement said.
The first set of capabilities to move to Azure will be Standard Chartered’s trade finance systems, which will facilitate seamless cross-border trade for the bank’s corporate and institutional clients.
«Covid-19 has further accelerated drive to digitize banking services, and we are determined to be at the forefront,» Standard Chartered group CEO Bill Winters said in a LinkedIn post about the annoucement.
