The Westpac Banking Corp (ASX: WBC) share price is having a positive day.
In afternoon trade, the banking giant's shares are up 1.2% to $21.83.
Why is the Westpac share price pushing higher?
While the big four banks are all pushing higher today, the Westpac share price is the best performer in the group. This is despite there being no market sensitive news out of Australia's oldest bank.
However, it has released an announcement relating to its digital strategy that could have given investor sentiment a little boost.
According to the release, Westpac has signed a five-year strategic partnership with tech giant Microsoft to help drive the bank's digital and hybrid multi-cloud strategy.
The partnership includes increased investment in Microsoft's cloud computing service, Azure, which is expected to help Westpac continue to modernise its technology environment and expand use of cloud-based systems.
Westpac's Chief Technology Officer, David Walker, commented: "At Westpac, our standard for all new systems, whether built by ourselves or sourced from others, is to be 'built to change' using 'evergreen' cloud-native technologies."
"We are looking to significantly scale up our use of the cloud across the bank, especially with software-as-a-service partners to help deliver more digital-to-the-core experiences for customers. This includes areas such as digital, mortgages, business lending, our banking-as-a-service platform, artificial intelligence, and data," he added.
The release explains that Westpac will look to leverage the ecosystem of services available on Azure to bring its application, data and artificial intelligence capabilities together in a more cohesive manner that can be scaled across the enterprise.
Microsoft Australia's Managing Director, Steven Worrall, appears confident the tech giant can provide Westpac with what it needs for the future of banking.
He said: "Westpac has a clear vision for the future of banking – combining high performance, trusted and secure cloud-based platforms with a highly skilled workforce to allow iterative innovation that will ensure the bank stays at the leading edge of financial services. Microsoft is delighted to help build the digital foundations for this and support Westpac to grow its learning culture and instil digital capabilities that keep it match-fit for the future of banking."
