95 F I NANC I A L S E R V I C E S to do in traditional systems where there is IT administrator access.” The appeal of such solutions is clear to see – and that’s why some of the globe’s biggest financial services companies are underpinned by Microsoft technologies. Late last year, for example, US bank Wells Fargo marked the next step in its digital transformation journey with a new multi-cloud strategy, relying on Microsoft Azure to provide a trusted and secure foundation across all of its functions – and to also better manage risk. “Wells Fargo and Microsoft have a longstanding relationship, and we are excited to build on that foundation to accelerate Wells Fargo’s digital transformation journey,” said Judson Althoff, Microsoft’s chief commercial officer, in a press release. “Microsoft Azure is empowering financial services institutions with its secure, compliant and scalable platform for industry cloud solutions needs, including for advanced and complex workloads. By standardising on the Microsoft cloud and trusting Azure as its most strategic and primary cloud platform across all lines of business, Wells Fargo will be able to advance its key business and technology transformation priorities across core areas like managing risk and control, personalised banking, and the digital branch of the future.” Japan’s Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group has also chosen the Microsoft Azure cloud as the common system infrastructure for its risk management, security and cost-savings benefits. Meanwhile, Swiss bank UBS is using Microsoft Azure for global scale and security, andCanadian investment bank TD Securities recently built on its Microsoft 365 Communication Compliance infrastructure with a highly secure, compliant global Microsoft Teams deployment. Despite these success stories, Microsoft hasn’t become complacent. As the threat of cybercrime evolves in the future, the company is making concerted efforts to ensure financial services organisations are protected for the unknown. “As remote work continues and cyberattacks increase in frequency, we can anticipate that cybercriminals will continue targeting and attacking all sectors of critical infrastructure, including healthcare and public health, information technology, financial services and energy,” Borden says. “Organisations will need to put themselves in a stronger position to address risk management and compliance challenges to successfully scale and grow. With that in mind, Microsoft has announced its commitment to quadruple its cybersecurity investment to $20 billion over the next five years.” Microsoft has also enhanced tools and resources to address a variety of cyber threats, manage security, and enable customers to manage governance of cloud. “Microsoft is committed to helping the industry improve time to value, reduce costs, increase agility and accelerate innovation for sustainable growth through digital transformation,” Borden concludes. “We offer cloud technology that helps organisations not only develop a comprehensive cyber-resilience strategy, but which makes preparing for a wide range of contingencies less complicated due to its scalability.” We asked a selection of Microsoft partners about how they are leveraging Microsoft technology to ensure financial services organisations can stay compliant and secure Partner perspectives “In financial services, trust is essential and security is crucial. We are a cloud-first company; it’s integrated into all our processes and partnering with industry experts like Microsoft ensures we maintain pace with best practices across a broad spectrum of areas. Our primary focus at Finastra is always finding ways to improve the customer experience at every step of their journey. It’s about finding the balance between creating efficiency through streamlined operations, managing risk and compliance, and delivering innovation and better experiences that improve the day-to-day roles of our customers.” Russ Soper Chief Information Officer, Finastra
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