ICBCT, IBM enter deal

Industrial and Commercial Bank of China Thai (ICBCT) and IBM Thailand have announced a three-year management of IT operations and resiliency services agreement as part of the bank’s expansion in Thailand.

Under this agreement, IBM will provide the bank with fully-managed services covering data centre infrastructure and operations, backup and disaster recovery, security, and process improvement. The agreement also covers the delivery of services to the bank’s local subsidiary, ICBC Thai Leasing Co Ltd.

ICBCT is a subsidiary of ICBC Ltd, the world’s largest bank in terms of Tier 1 capital, designated by People’s Bank of China as the RMB Clearing Bank in Thailand, and is looking to aggressively grow both the commercial and the consumer banking areas, leveraging strong global network across six continents.

“In partnering with IBM and by moving the bank’s IT infrastructure operations into a managed services model, ICBCT will benefit from measurably improved IT services and processes, security, resiliency, and extensive support from IBM’s IT expertise,” said Shiqiang Lin, chief executive of ICBCT.

“We are in an era of unprecedented business transformation, with increasingly high competitiveness and an expectation of ‘always-on’ service in the banking industry. The move toward the digital economy and the PromptPay initiatives are examples of market forces in Thailand making banks re-examine their internal IT capabilities. Maximum reliability is crucial for business success,” said Parnsiree Amatayakul, managing director of IBM Thailand.