Spain’s Banco Sabadell has agreed on a €1 billion (£852.5 million) digital transformation deal with IBM to overhaul its IT systems over the next ten years.
The bank will migrate to a hybrid cloud infrastructure, developed by IBM’s Red Hat unit, which it acquired in 2019.
The deal is an extension of an existing partnership between the two companies that will see IBM transform Sabadell’s technological infrastructure into an advanced platform, able to integrate all its data and applications and facilitate a centralised single customer view.
Sabadell is aiming to upgrade its computer systems to be more efficient as it handles more data and transactions from customers. The bank has also prioritised security and a readiness to adapt to regulatory changes as digitisation sweeps through the industry.
“As the financial sector develops its digitalisation process in a highly regulated environment, banks need to combine a huge capacity for customer-focused innovation with a technological environment that offers maximum levels of solidity, resilience and security,” said Marta Martinez, president of IBM Spain, Portugal, Greece and Israel.
“An open hybrid cloud platform, created and managed with in-depth knowledge of the financial sector, is the best possible foundation for confronting these challenges.”
According to Sabadell’s CEO, Jamie Guardiola Romojaro, the deal will not only increase its resilience, security and scalability but also help the bank adopt key elements of the new technologies and processes such as cloud, intensive use of data and artificial intelligence.
In November, IBM announced a deal with Bank of America to develop “the world’s first financial services-ready public cloud”. Like the Sabadell deal, the public cloud platform was said to be built using services acquired through its Red Hat deal.
The deal also extends to UK bank TSB, which is a subsidiary of Banco Sabadell and has previously worked with IBM during its 2018 meltdown nightmare. A report from IBM suggested that the bank didn’t carry out rigorous enough testing of its new systems.