A year after it added partners to its financial services-ready cloud, IBM has announced that the platform is now backed by more than 100 ecosystem partners that have committed to help customers accelerate cloud adoption and digital transformation throughout the financial services industry.
Announced in late 2019, IBM developed the IBM Cloud for Financial Services to help institutions balance the need to modernize with the industry’s security and regulatory requirements. The company has put partners at the center of the hybrid cloud and AI strategy and committed $1 billion to growing its ecosystem.
Last year, IBM announced the first ISV and SaaS partners to onboard their offerings to the platform. Assima, C3.ai, Finacle, Intellect Design, and Thought Machine were the first to commit to delivering their offerings through the platform, thereby providing participating banks with a way to ensure they are working with trusted vendors.
Each of the ISVs is part of the IBM public cloud ecosystem and goes through an onboarding process, supported by IBM and designed with the financial services-ready public cloud requirements.
According to IBM, a growing portion of the $1 trillion hybrid cloud market opportunity is comprised of the financial markets industry, which is expected to increase nearly 20% by 2024. Key findings in a recent IBM internal analysis suggest that cloud is expected to account for about 60% of that future market opportunity as financial institutions are accelerating innovation to meet heightened customer expectations, deliver consistent services in the face of challenges such as the global pandemic, and navigate the ever-complex regulatory environment.
IBM Cloud for Financial Services is designed to help banks host mission-critical workloads while adhering to their security and compliance regulations. Using IBM’s fourth-generation confidential computing capabilities and “Keep Your Own Key” encryption delivered via IBM Cloud Hyper Protect Services, partners and their customers can retain control of their data and transact in a highly secured environment.
The IBM Cloud for Financial Services Framework is designed to reduce third- and fourth-party risk in the digital supply chain through a common set of security and compliance controls that are adhered to by the entire ecosystem. These built-in controls are engineered to help partners and customers accelerate innovation, unlock new revenue opportunities and decrease the cost of compliance while fostering a growing ecosystem. Ecosystem partners, including NexJ Systems, Temenos, and Zafin, use IBM Cloud Hyper Protect Services to free up expenses and employee resources dedicated to security and compliance.
IBM is also helping its partners accelerate adoption of the IBM Cloud for Financial Services by addressing financial and technical obstacles that can hinder innovation through its Cloud Engagement Fund which was established as part of a $1 billion investment in its ecosystem.