SHB signs strategic partnership with Huawei to accelerate digital transformation and shape the future of banking

On April 19, in Hanoi, SHB (Saigon-Hanoi Bank) and Huawei Technologies signed a strategic cooperation agreement, marking an important step in SHB's comprehensive transformation journey and affirming the bank's proactive, leading role in implementing the Party and State's policies on scientific and technological development, innovation, and the national digital transformation. Representatives from both sides at the ceremony: 'SHB signs strategic cooperation with Huawei' (Photo: SHB). The cooperation with Huawei is an important link in that path, and clearly demonstrates SHB's direction: not only applying technology to optimize bank operations, but also creating a platform for a new development model where the bank plays the role of connecting resources and accompanying ecosystems in the digital economy. During the signing ceremony, Deputy Chairman of the SHB Board of Directors and Deputy CEO Do Quang Vinh emphasized: 'In the global digital transformation context, strategic cooperation with a leading technology group like Huawei is a breakthrough move, reflecting SHB's long-term vision and ambition to reach new heights. We define technology as the core driver to enhance competitiveness, optimize operations and increase customer experience. Through this cooperation, SHB will not only push the bank's comprehensive transformation but also contribute to innovation, the development of the digital economy, and sustainable national development in the new era.' According to the cooperation content, SHB and Huawei will focus on three pillars: promoting digitization and comprehensive modernization of banking activities; building an open, flexible technology architecture ready for the future; and enhancing operational capability with high stability, safety, and resilience of the system. Huawei will act as the overall strategic advisory partner, supporting SHB in planning the transformation roadmap, designing the technology architecture, building data platforms, and deploying advanced solutions. With global operations experience and a long history of partnering with major financial institutions, Huawei is expected to help SHB create system-wide breakthroughs, contributing to a modern, safe, flexible, and sustainable digital bank that meets international standards. More importantly, this cooperation goes beyond upgrading technology infrastructure. Huawei can bring deeper value, such as experience in building large-scale technology architectures, developing data and cloud platforms, enhancing governance of the system, and gradually developing operation capabilities based on data, artificial intelligence and automation. At the event, Spawn Fan, President of Huawei Enterprise Business in the Asia Pacific region, spoke about the cooperation with SHB as a significant milestone in expanding the company's market in Vietnam. With SHB's position in the domestic and international markets, Huawei hopes to supply modern technology products that contribute to SHB's strong transformation. Strategic Ecosystem Serving the Ecosystem Technology is identified as one of SHB's strategic pillars, and the bank is restructuring its entire operating model around a '5 FIRST' framework: Data + AI First, People First, Cloud First, Security First, Mobile First. Data + AI First places data and artificial intelligence at the center of every decision, from analyzing customer needs, forecasting behavior, risk assessment to personalizing products. People First asserts that technology must serve people, customers and create new capabilities for the workforce. Cloud First aims to build a flexible, modern infrastructure with scalable capacity. Security First places system and data safety as a prerequisite for trust and sustainable development. Mobile First defines mobile devices as the primary touchpoint of digital banking. This foundation also enables SHB to elevate customer experiences to be more modern, flexible, convenient, safe and secure, while increasing the bank's ability to serve large corporate clients, supply chains, strategic partners, and individual customers within a unified financial ecosystem. The SHB–Huawei partnership occurs within SHB's broader strategic direction: developing a partner ecosystem as a long-term growth engine. As such, SHB does not approach customers unit by unit, but through an entire ecosystem centered on the customer. From a leading corporation upstream, SHB expands its product, service and solution offerings to member companies, suppliers, distributors, agents, partners, employees and end customers. Each major collaboration not only accelerates credit growth but opens a multi-tier growth space for the bank. Cooperation with a major technology group like Huawei is part of SHB's long-term strategy to become the TOP 1 bank in efficiency; the most loved digital bank; the best retail bank; and the top bank supplying capital, financial products and services to strategic private and state customers, with supply chains, value chains, ecosystems, green development and individual customers. Looking to 2035, SHB aims to be a modern retail bank, a green bank, and a leading digital bank in the region's top tier. Not only stopping at applying new technology, SHB also targets expansion into regional and international markets, reinforcing its position as a modern, efficient, creative bank with a clear strategic vision. This is also part of the country's development path—taking digital transformation as a driving force for acceleration and breakthrough in the new era, the era of national ascent. The SHB–Huawei cooperation marks not only a new chapter for the two enterprises but is also part of efforts to promote cross-sector collaboration, including linking strategic development at the national level.