Why a Global SaaS Platform is So Important for Payments Innovation

Recently at Money2020, I had the pleasure of participating in a video interview with Finextra TV, where we discussed the challenges faced by card issuers today and the distinct advantages of a global cloud-based payments processing platform model. The software as a services (Saas) model for enterprise B2B software is widely accepted across many industry verticals worldwide, including banking, but in payments processing, acceptance has been slower. It’s time the payments industry catches up.

Click here to watch Lisa’s Finextra TV interview.

Many card issuers continue to rely on legacy on-premise payment processing systems, most of which were designed years ago and are inherently inflexible, complex, and require coding to change. Consequently, they don‘t have the control or flexibility that card issuers require to respond quickly to changing market conditions and customer needs and deliver the high-value, integrated digital payments solutions consumers expect.

Agile Processing Gives Card Issuers the Edge

A global cloud-based processing platform like i2c’s has distinct advantages when it comes to speed, reliability, cost, and innovation:

• Control: A A SaaS solution that is designed to be highly configurable, reliable, and scalable like i2c’s Agile Processing payment platform gives card issuers the ability to quickly and cost-effectively build, test, and deploy payment solutions and then roll them out anywhere in the world. Rather than a patchwork of different systems, a single, global cloud-based payment platform simplifies program development and deployment.

• Sandbox to Scale: A global SaaS platform gives issuers the control to create a new feature or product roadmap, test it, modify it based on market feedback, and deploy it using a sandbox to scale methodology to get to market quickly – something legacy payment platforms were never architected to support. Issuers can test new concepts or product ideas, apply any learning about their customers’ experiences, and then quickly put confirmed functionality into a production environment.

• Customization: For card issuers facing the challenge of rolling out multiple payment programs tailored for the needs of individual countries and markets, a one-size-fits-all approach simply does not work. A single global SaaS platform enables mass customization of payment programs that can quickly scale up or down to distinct markets.

• Global Innovation: A global SaaS payment processing platform that serves regional or global markets can act as a worldwide research and development hub for payments. When new capabilities or features are added to the payment processing platform to meet local requirements in different geographies, these improvements become available to any customer using the platform, globally.

• Continuous Improvement: Cloud-based payment processing platforms are updated automatically and regularly– monthly in the case of i2c’s Agile Processing platform– which means financial institutions benefit from continual improvement and always are using the latest features and updates.

• Focus on business, not on maintaining systems: With an outsourced payment platform, issuers don‘t have to be in the coding business. Free of having to manage an in-house system or legacy payments platform, card issuers can focus on their business and differentiating it from their competitors.

It’s time for the payments industry to recognize what other industries have known for many years – that a cloud-based payments processing platform is a more efficient, agile, reliable, and scalable. To learn more about i2c‘s flexible Agile Processing global SaaS platform, click here.