United Overseas Bank (UOB) (SGX: U11) and Amazon Web Services (AWS) have entered a memorandum of understanding to jointly examine cloud and artificial intelligence technologies aimed at strengthening the Singapore-based lender’s operations across Southeast Asia.
Announced in Singapore on 9 October 2026, the multi-year collaboration centres on a dedicated cloud environment hosted in Singapore as the foundation of a hybrid infrastructure approach described as the first of its kind for banking in the ASEAN region.
Under the agreement, the two organisations intend to assess how cloud computing and AI can improve operational resilience, satisfy regulatory and data-residency rules, and enhance customer experiences in UOB’s five ASEAN markets—Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and Vietnam.
The partnership combines UOB’s regional banking knowledge and governance practices with AWS’s cloud infrastructure, data capabilities and AI services.
Early priorities include hybrid cloud architecture, data and analytics, and AI-driven customer engagement.
Lawrence Goh, Head of Group Technology and Operations at UOB, noted that the bank views AI as a means to become more adaptive, intelligent and responsive.
He stated that achieving this requires a secure technology base, robust governance and suitable partners, and that the AWS relationship supports faster innovation, better customer experiences, higher productivity and long-term value creation.
He added that the collaboration could expand over time to cover further areas with the broader Amazon group.
Jaime Vallés, Vice President and Managing Director for APAC at AWS, observed that financial services affect millions of people across the Asia-Pacific, Japan and China region daily.
He said the work with UOB seeks to make those experiences better, faster and more personalised while resting on a trustworthy foundation.
Vallés highlighted that UOB would gain tools to innovate along with training programmes to build AI fluency and cloud skills among staff, all while protecting customer data, illustrating what is possible when deep regional banking expertise meets transformative cloud and AI technology.
The MoU will explore a future hybrid model in which UOB’s systems and data can run across both on-premises infrastructure and cloud environments.
This approach uses an isolated cloud extension that can be deployed in particular countries or jurisdictions to address local regulatory needs.
The parties describe the arrangement as the first between AWS and a bank to unite hybrid cloud capabilities in ASEAN with security, governance and data-residency controls tailored to a highly regulated sector.
For UOB, the plan involves a dedicated cloud environment inside Singapore designed to meet the bank’s security, governance and data-residency standards across its five ASEAN countries.
Data and systems would remain within this environment and could be configured to support each market’s compliance requirements, while the bank would still access cloud tools to modernize technology and develop new capabilities in AI and data analytics.
Beyond infrastructure, the collaboration will examine AI applications that could improve customer experience and internal operations.
These include conversational banking features and more personalised services powered by AWS AI tools.
Building on UOB’s existing Enterprise GenAI Platform, the bank will look at Amazon Bedrock—AWS’s fully managed service for building and scaling generative AI applications—to speed the development and deployment of AI solutions, ranging from employee productivity tools to enterprise-grade applications.
To prepare its workforce, UOB will also evaluate AWS’s structured learning and enablement programmes.
These would equip employees with skills in cloud technologies, generative AI, data and analytics, security and compliance, supporting the bank’s ongoing efforts to transform its workforce and ensure responsible development, deployment and scaling of cloud and AI solutions.