The leading European Bank Banco Santander has reportedly entered a deal with IBM to accelerate the deployment of technologies including blockchain. The news was revealed as a part of a press release on 13th February 2019.
According to reports, the global agreement will last for five years and would focus on enhancing the services of the bank through emerging technologies like artificial intelligence, big data, and blockchain of IBM.
The deal between Spain-based bank and IBM is said to value at nearly $700 million. The development is in line with the bank’s efforts to reduce annual costs by investing in the technology space for enabling the bank to offer open, flexible, and up-to-date IT ecosystem, as stated in the press release.
Commenting on the development, IBM General Manager for Santander Group, David Soto said that the bank is deploying IBM technology as it aims to enhance security and regulatory framework and to rapidly create new services to meet the emerging demands of the customers by using the technology as well as industry expertise of IBM.
In summer 2018, Banco Santander was reported of having developed a blockchain research team called the ‘Digital Investment Banking’ to explore the potential of blockchain tech to alter securities trading as well as other financial tools.
IBM has also collaborated with Boehringer Ingelheim, a pharmaceutical firm to deploy blockchain in clinical recordkeeping, as per a Cointelegraph report.
Nevertheless, the agreement with Santander Group will strengthen IBM’s role as a prime transformation partner. IBM through the deal will provide the bank with additional solutions and expertise that will strengthen the bank’s strategic aim of creating the up-to-date IT ecosystem.
The foundation of the ecosystem would be a transformation to a hybrid and multi-cloud infrastructure. To deploy Santander’s hybrid cloud strategy, the financial institution has developed its own Cloud Competence Center. The collaboration with IBM will accelerate the transformation. Separately, the bank is deploying various technologies such as IBM DevOps solutions as well as IBM API Connect focused to develop, launch, and penetrate latest applications and digital services more effectively.
The tech giant will also play a significant role in providing the effective tools for the bank’s transformation by ensuring the latest technology at the bank conform to the highest level of commercial security standard as set by the Government of the US for data, services, and applications. The deployment of the IBM Security tools in mobile applications, as well as in incident response, would enable the bank to strengthen the security of its operations as well as customers.
Commenting on the collaboration, David Chaos, Santander Global CIO said the deal will enable us to have a partner with best technical expertise in the world to help accelerate the much required IT transformation. David further said that the collaboration will provide the bank with great support towards its aim to constant progress while ensuring steady investment in technology.
