The News: IBM (NYSE: IBM) announced last week a partnership with Lotte Card, a Korean credit card company, to transition its entire enterprise system to a hybrid cloud environment. Read more at the IBM News Room.
IBM Financial Services Cloud Collaborates with Lotte Card on Transition to Hybrid Cloud
Analyst Take: The Lotte Card partnership is big news for IBM’s cloud strategy. The credit card company will essentially transition the company’s entire enterprise system to a hybrid cloud environment using cloud technology from IBM and Red Hat Openshift — including its core financial accounting systems.
The Korean credit card company’s retail customers include department stores, movie theatres, and hypermarkets, which are large markets featuring groceries and other basic needs items where most Koreans do their shopping. Lotte Card started its experiment with the cloud by migrating its mobile applications
The financial services industry has, in some instances, been swift to embrace digital transformation, but it’s probably also safe to say the coronavirus COVID-19 has caused an even more rapid shift. Companies the world over are seeking greater scalability and security, business resiliency strategies, along with the ability to more rapidly serve customers by way of AI-powered automation and quicker response times. Greater visibility into operating systems, reduction and mitigation of risk, regulatory compliance, and decreasing IT complexity are all drivers of this move. And the ramifications in dealing with a global pandemic aside, the financial services industry in general and the card and payments sector specifically has no choice but to innovate to stay competitive.
This hybrid cloud strategy, powered by IBM and Red Hat, will allow Lotte greater flexibility to adapt to what is an ever-changing market situation, as well as to compete more effectively in a culture where mobile first is a way of life and ease of use and personalized service is expected. Financial services providers are quickly discovering that traditional IT structures cannot offer the flexibility, personalization, and agility that they need to provide customers what they want when they want it.
IBM has introduced DevOps-based agile methodology so as to speed up processes relating to development, testing, modification and release of new software or services in the cloud and I noted with interest that IBM will also be providing automation services to help provide secure operating environments and efficient system operations.
Automation, security, Dev-Ops agile methodology, and open hybrid cloud technologies — this is the magic formula for the banking and financial services (and card and payments) sector moving forward and it’s easy to see IBM plus Red Hat OpenShift playing a bigger role here moving forward.
The Lotte Card partnership, combined with last week’s CaixaBank deal to accelerate its hybrid cloud journey are solid wins for IBM Cloud on Red at OpenShift. IBM’s Financial Services Ready Public Cloud, together with these efforts demonstrate the growing reach and capabilities for IBM Cloud.
Be on the lookout for Futurum’s Financial Services Cloud Market Insight report, which is an in-depth look at the market and analysis from the Futurum Research team, scheduled to be published in the next few weeks.
Futurum Research provides industry research and analysis. These columns are for educational purposes only and should not be considered in any way investment advice.
Other insights from Futurum Research:
IBM Adds CaixaBank to Extend Vertical Cloud Wins
Think 2020: IBM Goes Vertical With the Financial Services Ready Cloud
The COVID-10 Driven Evolution of the Financial Services Sector
Image Credit: IBM
The original version of this article was first published on Futurum Research.
Shelly Kramer is a Principal Analyst and Founding Partner at Futurum Research. A serial entrepreneur with a technology centric focus, she has worked alongside some of the world’s largest brands to embrace disruption and spur innovation, understand and address the realities of the connected customer, and help navigate the process of digital transformation. She brings 20 years' experience as a brand strategist to her work at Futurum, and has deep experience helping global companies with marketing challenges, GTM strategies, messaging development, and driving strategy and digital transformation for B2B brands across multiple verticals. Shelly's coverage areas include Collaboration/CX/SaaS, platforms, ESG, and Cybersecurity, as well as topics and trends related to the Future of Work, the transformation of the workplace and how people and technology are driving that transformation. A transplanted New Yorker, she has learned to love life in the Midwest, and has firsthand experience that some of the most innovative minds and most successful companies in the world also happen to live in “flyover country.”