Mumbai, Feb. 25: Bank of India will outsource its infotech infrastructure and application needs to Hewlett Packard (H-P) in a $150-million deal, the largest in the Asia-Pacific region so far.

Under the 10-year agreement, H-P will implement and manage a core banking solution in 750 branches of the bank. The solution is based on the Finacle application of Infosys Technologies. H-P will also work with Oracle for database and data warehouse solutions.

The contract is expected to reduce operative costs of the bank and provide business benefits.

H-P will provide a complete solution, including the core banking solution, data warehouse software, operating systems, related hardware and management of the infrastructure and services in the bank’s branches.

The IT major will supply and maintain servers, desktops and peripherals across the branches. Apart from building and managing a data centre, the contract envisages help-desk and call-centre facilities.

Bank of India chairman and managing director M. Venugopalan said while the bank has spent close to Rs 200 crore on technology so far, it intends to spend around Rs 60 crore annually over the next decade for maintenance and upgradation.

“So far, we have been providing the hardware and getting the solutions from independent vendors. Now H-P will cater to all the requirements of the bank and also train our staff,” he added.

Infosys chairman and chief mentor . R. Narayana Murthy said technology in banks would not only bring down costs, but also improve productivity. They have been rapidly inducting technology due to liberalisation and emergence of private sector and foreign banks, he added.

Even as banks are leveraging the power of communications and technology, five out of eight private sector units and only five nationalised ones have adopted integrated solutions.