ANZ, IBM sign AU$450 million deal on strategic partnership
Australia and New Zealand Banking Group just signed a deal with multinational tech giant IBM on Asian strategic partnership, valued at AU$450 million. The deal will offer ANZ better capabilities in driving innovation and productivity throughout the organisation.
ANZ's new partnership will potentially increase its capacity to manage its growing customer portfolio and transactions across its digital, mobile and bank branch channels. This also supports the company's regional expansion, allowing it to access IBM's resources which include next generation cloud development capabilities, Innovation Lab, core systems infrastructure and vast software portfolio.
As part of the partnership, both IBM and ANZ can co-invest on the innovation lab where ANZ developers can create, test and execute new services and applications. ANZ has been adopting a new technology strategy different from banking peers like Commonwealth Bank of Australia. The bank is looking over an ambitious overhaul of its traditional internal technology systems. ANZ will not be going for a "big bang" core systems overhaul. Rather, it will be allocating AU $1.5 billion annual technology spending on strengthening Asian networks and China endeavor.
ANZ chief information officer Scott Collary said, in an interview with The Australian Financial Review, that the deal was crucial for both organisations. This will open new technological and development work, which can mean quicker implementation compared to before.
"We will use the lab to support the entire super-regional network. As we look at digital and data capability, a lot of that will be supported by the new hardware and software platforms and tested out in the lab," Collary explained.
"We have had a lot of IBM hardware and software in the past, it was very specific in terms of buying specific licenses or equipment, this new deal gives us the full range of its capabilities." The contract is beneficial for IBM as it continues to struggle against transitioning corporate technology to cloud computing.
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