IBM Press release – ERI and the IBM Public cloud

ERI Bancaire enhances its core banking system
to further support a software as a service (SaaS) model with IBM public cloud
The new offering hosted on IBM public cloud will give private banking customers more flexibility

Zürich/Genf, June 2, 2020. IBM today announced that ERI Bancaire, a real‐time banking solutions provider for the global financial industry, is adopting IBM public cloud to host its OLYMPIC Banking System’s platform to extend its offering as a software as a service (SaaS) model. Moving the solution from on premise to the cloud will enable its private banking customers to keep costs low by better aligning infrastructure size with actual and changing demand, maintain availability, and help meet the regulatory obligations for security and compliance of the financial services industry.

There are few industries as heavily regulated as banking. For smaller financial firms this can become a great challenge as they require the same flexibility and face the same compliance and security requirements as larger banks, but they feel greater cost pressures. In response, ERI worked with IBM to bring its OLYMPIC Banking System on the IBM public cloud to extend this solution as a SaaS model, providing the flexibility in cost and better workload management by aligning infrastructure
size with actual and changing demand, while also helping meet the regulatory obligations of the industry.

The solution incorporates IBM Cloud Kubernetes Service to manage containers and provides users with a browser‐based, real‐time core banking system that can deliver multi‐country and multi‐jurisdiction support. Further, the IBM public cloud is serving as a development engine for ERI’s offerings, delivering access to higher value technology, including AI, to help drive innovation and better serve their customers.

“There is a big value in the elasticity and flexibility of the cloud,” explains Jean‐Philippe Bersier, Director for Business Development at ERI. “Banks have to pay particular attention to end of month, quarter and year closures. It’s their busiest time. And with a traditional structure, they would have to size for those peaks, which can be challenging for certain firms. By leveraging IBM public cloud and a SaaS model, we can let them adjust the costs of their underlying infrastructure to exactly what they need.”

The cloud‐based platform will offer ERI’s clients a resilient and secure architecture with the flexibility to help eliminate planned or unplanned downtime. In addition the IBM cloud site in Frankfurt supports the IBM EBA Cloud Compliance Certificate, a self‐certification IBM developed to help customers to meet the high regulatory requirements of the banking and financial industry. The certificate reflects standard IBM public cloud processes and policies at a level of detail required by the European Banking Authority (EBA) as well as the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (FINMA). The IBM public cloud is one ofthe industry’s most secure and open public cloud for business.

„By adopting IBM public cloud, ERI is taking the next step forward for its business by providing its customers with innovative products and services”, states Maja Kumme‐Kühn, ISV & Public Cloud Channel Sales Leader DACH.“With IBM public cloud, ERI is able to provide its clients the security and flexibility to help them meeting the high security standards required from a banking solution.”