Image: Asha McLean/ZDNet

Microsoft has on Monday announced a partnership with SWIFT, hoping to facilitate the future deployment of the latter's messaging service in the cloud.

Announced during day one of Sibos in Sydney, the pair of companies said they have conducted a cloud-native proof of concept to host SWIFT infrastructure and enable payment transfers on Microsoft Azure.

SWIFT provides financial messaging services to more than 11,000 financial institutions in over 200 countries.

Currently, enterprises and financial institutions conduct these transactions by sending payment messages over the SWIFT network, leveraging on-premises installations of SWIFT technology.

The Azure offering will see this tech taken to the cloud, touted as improving speed and security.

Microsoft's internal treasury department is serving as the initial user for the proof of concept.

According to the tech giant, the Microsoft Treasury group manages over $150 billion in assets and supports over $400 billion per year in SWIFT-based payments, supporting operations in over 190 countries.

Also see: Notorious cyber crime gang behind global bank hacking spree returns with new attacks

It was explained in a blog post that the proof of concept works by Microsoft Treasury sending a wire instruction -- through SAP on Azure -- that then gets validated using machine learning algorithms.

Once validated for authenticity, the wires are then sent to SWIFT via Microsoft's SWIFT installation on the cloud. SWIFT validates the wire instructions and sends it off to the appropriate bank. Once the bank completes the wire instruction it sends confirmation over to Microsoft.

"This is a big step forward in demonstrating the potential of the cloud in improving back office operational efficiency," SWIFT head of customer platforms Arnaud Boulnois said.

"SWIFT continually seeks to reduce and remove friction and eliminate operational inefficiencies within the financial services payment ecosystem.

"Cloud adoption continues to increase within the financial services industry."

Microsoft and SWIFT have completed the first Azure payment already, hoping to bring the solution to via private preview to joint customers in the "near future".

According to Microsoft, beyond the immediate operational and security benefits in moving to the cloud, there is significant potential to add additional business logic, such as advanced analytics and AI.

SEE ALSO

SWIFT to test instant cross-border gpi payments in Australia

ANZ bank, the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, and NAB are part of the trial using the New Payments Platform for instant cross-border payments.

Linux now dominates Azure

The most popular operating system on Microsoft's Azure cloud today is -- drumroll please -- Linux.

Why blockchain is essential to the future of banking and finance (TechRepublic)

Blockchain will begin to transform financial transactions in 2018. Lighthouse Partners' Pete Harris explains how this technology works, and what businesses can do to get started using it.