Bank Technology News articles from November 2003

Bank Technology News archives from November 2003

Credit Card Marketing: Lawsuit Gives Amex a Bounce: Visa, MC scramble as Amex targets banks.
November 1, 2003... Consumers can kiss those no-interest credit cards goodbye: Visa and MasterCard may be scavenging for income to pay off their burgeoning legal bills. The recent court decision reaffirming the anti-competitive behavior of Visa's and MasterCard's...

Leasing: Equipment Rental Fraught with Peril: And at which point is it better to simply buy?
November 1, 2003... Not to overstate the obvious, but leasing IT equipment can be perilous. For a large bank with thousands of branches, simply keeping track of all the equipment leases is difficult enough. IT departments must also negotiate the best service...

Business Banking: Fleet Taps S1 for Web Banking: Firm seeks to create common platform.(FleetBoston )
November 1, 2003... Since launching its popular J2EE-based, open- architecture enterprise platform in early 2002, banking software provider S1 Corp. has signed up some 90 customers, most of them small- to mid-sized banks. But S1's biggest coup to date has involved...

Getting Serious About the Obvious In 2003: If "normal" security challenges seem daunting, then compliance with regulations such as the Patriot Act can only be viewed as overwhelming.(Industry Overview)
November 1, 2003... This year will be remembered for many things, little of which involves technology. Top of mind is the costly war in Iraq, the rewrite-the-rules recall in California and the colossal losses of the Boston Red Sox and the Chicago Cubs. Yet for...

De Novos: Jump Starting With Outsourcing: Redwood, United, Bridge have signed on with firm.
November 1, 2003... Redwood Capital Bank isn't scheduled to open for business until December, but when it does, the new firm hopes a solid IT foundation will make it look as if the bank has always been there. "We'll have core processing, Internet, ATM, network...

....NewsMakers....NewsMakers....NewsMakers....
November 1, 2003... Check-Image Plans Accelerate Image replacement and ACH originations are likely to see the most dynamic growth over the next five years, a sign that pending check-image legislation will truly cut paper-based payment transactions, according...

Optical Card Designed for South Africa's Rural Poor.(by BSI2000 and eUnity Financial Services)
November 1, 2003... Banks increasingly see the "unbanked" as an important source of new business, but offering such customers services can be a risky and daunting challenge given the tenuousness of their financial lives. The problem is particularly acute in...

Talking to Latinos: Dexma launches Spanish language toolkit for mortgages.
November 1, 2003... Buying a house is complicated enough when the documents are written in English-language legalize. But when your native language is Spanish, that transaction can be downright intimidating ow Dexma believes it has solved that problem. The...

Stormy Weather?: Launch of Eurex U.S. is kicking up controversy in Chicago.
November 1, 2003... Forget Cubs fans' fury over Steve Bartman's pennant-grabbing interference at Wrigley. The deepest hostility in Chicago these days is over Eurex's attempt to muscle into a derivatives market dominated by the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and the...

Next-Generation ATM Promises Affordability.(Tranax Technologies MBS5000 Series ATM)
November 1, 2003... Tranax Technologies has released its MBS5000 Series ATM. Designed by financial technology experts for the needs of financial institutions, the PC-based MBS5000 promises affordability and dependability. The firm's target market is community...

Odds & Ends.
November 1, 2003... * Republic Bank & Trust Co. of Louisville, KY, has selected S1 Branch Banking Solutions, a product of S1 Corp. The bank will use its teller application and sales and service platform in Kentucky and Indiana branches. *...

Is Self-Parody Now The New Standard?
November 1, 2003... Banks have spent a lot of money gobbling up domain names to stave off Web sites that poke holes through parody. If you're ABC Bank, it's become a necessity to control ABCBanksucks.com or ihateABCBank.com. But very few banks, if any, actually...

Techies.(Brief Article)
November 1, 2003... Fiserv Inc. has named Mark J. Damico, the former president of Canada-based INTRIA Items in Canada, as president of the Fiserv Item Processing Group. Umpqua Bank, a subsidiary of Umpqua Holdings Corp., has named Tim Meier as its CIO, responsible...

Message Board.
November 1, 2003... "Credit cards are not such an exclusive club anymore." Avivah Litan, vp of financial services, Gartner Inc. on the need for American Express to enter the market dominated by Visa and MasterCard. "If they're all your employees, you can...

By the Numbers.
November 1, 2003... Of the various types of open-loop, stored-value cards which are usable at multiple merchants and ATMs, payroll and benefit cards represent the largest U.S. opportunities, estimated at $143.1 billion in 2007. Though 60 percent of private-sector...

Wireless World Poses Security Risks.(VP of information-security business strategy at Symantec Corp., Louis Carpenito)(Interview)
November 1, 2003... As vp of information-security business strategy at Symantec Corp., Louis Carpenito is used to worrying about the unknown. With his 32 years of experience in technology, including four years with Fidelity Investments, Carpenito has seen it all...

Outsourcing Hits Mortgage Lending in a Big Way.
November 1, 2003... Low interest rates have been good for the economy in many ways, chief among these fueling a mortgage and refinancing boom with record loan originations over the last couple of years. The low-rate environment has also been good for a...

What's Up, Doc? Bank of America's E-Payments.(Bank of America Global Treasury Services)
November 1, 2003... Healthcare professionals have to deal with reams of paper, and it's Bank of America Global Treasury Services' goal to reduce that burden at least a little. The institution and Blue Cross of California are collaborating to expedite the...

Shared Branching: When Credit Unions Unite: CUs are sharing branch and ATM resources in a strategy envied by their banking brethren.(the merger of Service Centers Corp. and Co-Op Network)
November 1, 2003... The merger of Service Centers Corp. and Co-Op Network last year created a network of branch facilities and ATMs for credit unions looking to offer members greater convenience and enhanced service. Since then, SCC has been using its access to...

The Check's Not in the Mail. It's on the Web.(check imaging)
November 1, 2003... All it takes is one customer's experience to explain the value that check imaging has produced for North Country Savings Bank in Canton, N.Y. North Country svp Mike Noble tells the story of a customer with checking accounts at both North...

Tailoring Consumer Solutions with New ATM.(Diebold's Opteva)
November 1, 2003... Eastern Bank is getting its feet wet in branch automation by embracing the latest in ATM technology and sporting offerings ranging from Internet access to personalized marketing. The bank has installed an Opteva lobby cash dispenser at an...

Innovators and Ingenuity.
November 1, 2003... Before the heady internet days when 20-somethings ran startups and vc firms doled out money like Halloween candy, there were contrarian thinkers. They were the bankers who believed that only three things matter in financial services: making...

Innovator: Finding Equals in a Merger: Jean Davis's responsibility is to integrate all of Wachovia's systems, technologies and operations since its 2001 merger with First Union. It wasn't a cake walk, but the new entity is beginning to hum.(the 2001 merger between First Union Corp and Wachovia Corp)
November 1, 2003... Even in the best of times, mergers between large banks are difficult to pull off successfully, especially when it comes to combining the technology of competing legacy platforms. But the 2001 merger between First Union Corp. and Wachovia...

Innovator: Tech's Found The Right Place: Mellon's brightest IT light says technology should never be at the forefront of a firm's strategic vision. And as firms play catchup with their investments, she says they're starting to understand that.(Janey A. Place; Mellon Financial)
November 1, 2003... Janey A. Place has never been one of those technologists who believed technology was king. As president of Mellon Lab and On-line Services, she has learned that technology works best as a silent, but powerful partner. "Business innovation is...

Home Is Where The Bank Is: Bank One turned a lot of heads when it decided against outsourcing its technology operation in favor of handling things in-house. But the move has paid off big time for the institution and its contrarian CIO.
November 1, 2003... A large and arguably most important part of leadership lay in having the courage of one's convictions. And for Austin Adams, there's no fear of being second-guessed when it comes to Bank One's controversial decision to insource its technology,...

Ingenuity: Getting Inside Their Minds: Genalytics is at the heart of a new wave of predictive technology that aims to predict a consumer's activities so well that an institution can achieve truly targeted pitches, putting mass marketing in the past.
November 1, 2003... Would John Doe of Salinas, CA, be more likely to sign up for a platinum Visa card, a CD or a money market deposit account? Knowing the answer to that question and the precise time to send the offer could mean a new customer for a financial...

Ingenuity: It's All About Networking: Downtime costs banks more money than they realize. A group of Stanford grad students aims to change that by improving overall network performance.
November 1, 2003... In a new age of fiscal responsibility where finger pointing and buck passing are no longer tolerated, some firms are turning to a group of Bay Area physics scholars to set their IT networks in the straight and narrow. "We're looking at...

Lose A Legacy, Gain Ground: For years banks have been looking to leapfrog their legacy systems in the race to adopt better technology. That means accessing and managing disparate sources of data within banks' existing infrastructure.
November 1, 2003... It's no secret that most legacy systems in banking survive thanks to middleware. Such middleware is useful in retrofitting new services into older core systems, it doesn't position banks for future technology adoption. This long-standing,...

Interview: In The Year 2525...: Futurist John B. Mahaffie has a vision for financial services: Make it convenient for the customer. And while branches are in vogue now, he doesn't think we'll see them after 2018.(Interview)
November 1, 2003... Futurist John B. Mahaffie makes his living looking at what's to come, and then advising companies how best to prepare. Simply put, Mahaffie is an agent of change. Formerly a principal of Coates & Jarratt, he has been a consultant since 1987,...

The Rise Of Biometrics: The factor that will push more U.S. financial firms into adopting biometrics is fraud and ID theft. "Biometrics is a no-brainer," says Richard Norton of the National Biometric Project.(Industry Overview)
November 1, 2003... Tom Cruise's portrayal of a renegade cop who foils an iris ID scanner didn't do the biometrics industry any favors by implying that a Minority Report-type world exists only in the faraway future. For banks, the future is closer than they think:...

The Eyes Have It.(iris recognition)
November 1, 2003... Look out, Indiana Jones, perhaps the Holy Grail has been found. The most promising technology for financial services firms, say analysts and industry observers, is iris recognition, given its high accuracy rate and low potential for privacy...

Aggregation May Be Worth the Aggravation: Charter One enters development pact with Corillian.
November 1, 2003... For many years Charter One didn't want to be bothered with aggregation since there didn't seem to be enough practical uses for having all of a customer's information at one's fingertips. That recently changed when the bank discovered a new...

Currency Conversion Hub Aids Internet Merchants.
November 1, 2003... E-business provider DXStorm.com is expanding its multi-currency conversion product this month for Internet merchants looking to affordably ease into global markets. The Toronto-based DxStorm recently partnered with electronic transaction...

Comerica Taps Citrix for Security at Its Endpoint.
November 1, 2003... A new security company is battling hackers that have been the Achilles heel of traditional remote access products. Launched in March, WholeSecurity, a provider of on-demand endpoint security products, is teaming with Citrix Systems to...

Fee Income: Cash is King For ATM Biz.(Banc Investment Group has launched a first-of-its-kind ATM funding program)
November 1, 2003... Banc Investment Group has launched a first-of-its-kind ATM funding program to help independent banks generate fee income from excess liquidity on their balance sheets. ATM Cash Advantage enables banks to advance up to $400 million in...

Bermuda Bank Automates Cross-Border Work.(Heliograph's eVent)
November 1, 2003... For a bank that does a wide array of complex cross-border trades and transactions like the Bank of Bermuda, automating the processing of these corporate actions is paramount to correcting what many in the industry say can be a mistake-filled...

Managing Processes Key to Reaping Tech Benefits.
November 1, 2003... It has become clear that the key competitive differentiator for all lenders is not technology itself but the efficient and effective management of business processes. This has given rise to a new process-centric product, one that leverages...

Automating Loan-Sweep Programs Attracts Clients.(National City)
November 1, 2003... When National City recog-nized the need to automate its loan sweep program, it was looking for a mainframe platform to encompass loan sweeps, investment sweeps and several other sweep products. The right product, together with superb execution,...

Smart Firms Bank on Customer Intelligence.
November 1, 2003... With the drop in mortgage interest rates, I jumped on the refinancing bandwagon using my current bank. The following impersonal form letter was sent to me as a follow-up to my refi. I changed the bank's name, supervisor name, and phone number:...

Unlocking CRM Value Through Segmentation: Banks have customer insights. Now put them to work.(Industry Overview)
November 1, 2003... In their efforts to organically attract, grow and retain profitable customers, banks face daunting challenges. They want to know their customers better and track their changing preferences, but struggle to process and analyze huge amounts of...

Record Archives Need Trustworthy Storage: New rules mandate stiffer requirements for data storage.
November 1, 2003... A great deal has been written about a range of archival storage technologies, but very little is being said about how these technologies should be properly integrated into a long-term data storage strategy. Many people consider archival...

Ongoing Network Automation Key to Profitability.(Industry Overview)
November 1, 2003... The two-and-a-half trillion-dollar financial services industry offers tremendous opportunities for continued strong growth, and the importance of reliable networking will be a major factor in deciding which companies succeed and which do not....

Branch Revitalization At BofA Raises the Bar: Old channel resurrected with next-generation tech.
November 1, 2003... Throughout the 1990s, efficiency and cost-cutting were central to retail strategies. Banks sought to reduce transaction cycle times to increase branch efficiency. Acquisitions and mergers created larger banks with higher transaction volumes...

Pursuing Risk Management Guidelines.
November 1, 2003... Risk is an inevitable component of any financial organization. The very existence of a financial institution is to take risk. And though there is no method to eliminate risk completely, regulations have been issued from time to time to assist...