Umpqua Bank is cultivating its “human-digital” strategy as it approaches a partnership with Tacoma, Wash.-based Columbia Bank that will boost its market share on the West Coast.

“Our human-digital initiatives remain critical to our long-term strategy as our customers continue to engage with us through digital channels at an accelerated pace,” Cort O’Haver, president and chief executive officer of the $30.9 billion bank’s parent company, Umpqua Holdings Corp., said during Thursday’s third-quarter earnings call.

The Portland, Ore-based bank’s human-digital initiatives include Umpqua Go-To, a financial advisor app launched in September 2018 that allows users to select and connect with a personal banker via text, call or video chat. Go-To supplements Umpqua’s mobile banking app.

“Notably, Go-To enrollments continued to increase, and we are getting close to the 100,000 mark,” O’Haver said. Umpqua saw 3% more mobile deposit transactions, 39% more Zelle transactions and 10% more daily sessions within its mobile banking app in Q3 compared with Q3 2020.

In addition to retail growth, the bank’s human-digital initiatives “also support our commercial customer acquisition efforts,” O’Haver said. Those include a partnership with Visa finalized in the second quarter to offer Visa Commercial Pay, a mobile app-based solution that includes instant-issue virtual commercial cards for travel and expense, point-of-sale and supplier payments.

Umpqua also launched a pilot program called Consolidated Payments, O’Haver noted. “This will allow commercial and business clients to fully outsource their payments to Umpqua in a variety of formats, including checks, ACH, wires and commercial cards complete with [application programming interface] APIs to over 160 different accounting platforms,” he said.

Partnership to create second-largest regional bank on West Coast

Umpqua earlier this month announced plans to merge with $17.3 billion Columbia Bank in an all-stock transaction. The deal ― expected to close mid-2022 ― will include both banks operating under the parent company Columbia Banking System, Inc., with stock trading under Columbia’s ticker symbol (COLB) on the Nasdaq Stock Exchange, according to a release.

The combined bank will be known as Umpqua Bank while Columbia’s wealth management services will operate under the Columbia brand, according to the release.

The two banks’ CEOs said the combination would add Umpqua’s retail expertise to Columbia’s commercial strengths, building on technology infrastructure and aiming for a stronger regional position.

“Our scale will provide us with the flexibility to increase investments to build on our already strong technology infrastructure,” Clint Stein, president and chief executive officer at Columbia Bank, said on a call announcing the Umpqua-Columbia combination. “We start our partnership with a robust foundation, given each organization’s investments of people and funds into providing a contemporary array [of technology].”

Customers will benefit from complementary services available from both banking systems, O’Haver said on the announcement call.

“A robust balance sheet encompasses a top-tier funding profile and diversified loan portfolio across commercial and retail to fuel strategic technology investments and truly unlock the power of our bankers to deliver enhanced solutions to customers,” O’Haver said. “Columbia probably leans more into the commercial side of technology … and we probably leaned into the retail side. So there’s another complementary combination there where we were investing our dollars,” said he added.

O’Haver also alluded to “potential revenue opportunities that can be gained from using those technologies made for each other’s companies ― so, just another great example of creating the West’s leading regional bank.”

Umpqua does not break out technology expenditures but reported net income of $108.1 million for the third quarter, down 13.5% from net income of $124.9 million year over year. The bank’s revenue for Q3 was $308.8 million, 11.5% lower than revenue of $349.0 million YoY.

Umpqua [Nasdaq: UMPQ] shares closed at $21.01 at 4:20 p.m., up 1.11% from market open.