Principal Malaysia Builds on AWS for Digital Transformation to Deliver Enhanced Customer Experiences at Scale

Principal Malaysia (Principal), a joint venture between Principal Financial Group^® (PFG), a Nasdaq-listed global financial services company, and CIMB Group Holdings Berhad, today announced it has selected Amazon Web Services (AWS), an Amazon.com company, as its preferred cloud provider to progress its digital transformation journey and enhance customer experience.

Principal is a financial services industry first-mover in full scale data center migration from on-premises to AWS cloud in Malaysia and ASEAN. By moving 150 servers and 35 business-critical applications, including core business systems such as Customer Relationship Management (CRM) to AWS, Principal gains the rapid scalability and agility of the cloud. This allows Principal to keep meeting evolving client needs.

“At Principal, we are committed to empowering our customers on their financial journey. The collaboration with AWS demonstrates our commitment to accommodate our customers’ evolving needs and help improve their access to financial solutions. By leveraging AWS cloud technology, we strive to continue supporting our customers in building, protecting, and advancing their financial well-being,” said Munirah Khairuddin, CEO of Principal Malaysia and Global Islamic, Managing Director of Strategic Distribution & Institutional Clients for Principal Southeast Asia.

With a cloud-first strategy, Principal is enabled to constantly evaluate the industry landscape and pivot business decisions swiftly and with flexible options. Malaysia’s investing population is growing, and Principal needed a scalable and agile environment to rapidly and securely create sophisticated and engaging investing services that appeal to this expanding customer base across Malaysia and beyond.

“Globally, Principal’s collaboration with AWS allows us to adapt quickly to meet customer demands, improve speed to market, and deliver more personalized experiences at a pace that we haven’t been able to in the past,” said Kathy Kay, executive vice president and chief information officer at Principal Financial Group. “This helps us make faster and smarter decisions to meet the evolving needs of our customers.”

Adopting AWS cloud, and training Principal staff on its use, has radically shifted the organization’s technology culture from functioning in silos, to thriving across business units that are enabled to adjust to changing consumer preferences with increased efficiency.

Shifting to the cloud model leveraging AWS’s global infrastructure – Amazon Relational Database Service, which helps organizations set up, operate, and scale a relational database in the cloud; Amazon API Gateway, a fully managed service that enables developers to create, publish, maintain, monitor, and secure APIs at any scale easily; and Amazon Connect, a cloud-based contact center – allows Principal to invest in new technologies, reduce its data center footprint, and create global business opportunities, driving digital transformations across multiple lines of business.

“Financial service leaders in the asset management industry like Principal are increasingly turning to cloud technology to move from ideas to implementation quickly, while delivering personalized experiences that are secure and fully compliant with regulatory frameworks,” said Pete Murray, country manager, Malaysia and head of FSI, ASEAN, AWS. “AWS is proud to support Principal as they innovate, respond to new market opportunities, and evolve to meet changing customer needs here in Malaysia, and we look forward to supporting Principal’s mission to foster a world where financial security is accessible by all.”

For more information, please visit www.principal.com.my.