Clear2Pay and XOOM partner to offer a turn-key remittance solution

Clear2Pay’s technology platform and XOOM’s remittance network join forces to offer out-of-the-box solution

Brussels/Las Vegas – 16 October 2006 – Clear2Pay, the international software vendor of next generation payment solutions for financial institutions and Xoom Corporation, one of the fastest growing money transfer service providers in the U.S., today announced a partnership to offer a turn-key remittance solution for banks and financial institutions.


The combination of Clear2Pay’s Bank Payment Hub with Xoom’s worldwide remittance network means banks can originate remittance transactions at the teller line, from ATMs and on the Web to thousands of locations worldwide, including cities and towns in Mexico, India and China. The turnkey offering gives banks complete control over price, foreign exchange (FX) spread, float and product branding.

”Now it is easier than ever for banks to deliver a competitive remittance offering out-of-the-box without the hassle of building and maintaining an expensive foreign correspondent network,” said Matt Ellis, VP and General Manager for Clear2Pay Americas.

Some of the highlights of the combined product offering include:

• A fully hosted model with low cost of entry to a traditionally cost prohibitive business;
• Thousands of cash pickup locations in all major remittance corridors, including Mexico and Latin America, the Philippines, China, and even home delivery of cash in key countries like the Dominican Republic, the Philippines and India;
• 24/7 service and support for the transactions and active management of the delivery partner network, and;
• The ability to manage existing foreign correspondent relationships and other corridor partners using the Clear2Pay Remittance software.

“Banks wanting build their own fully integrated remittance service face the daunting task of re-engineering front-end and back-office systems, hundreds of middleware applications and their own recipient networks around the world,” said Gene Gutierrez, senior vice president of business development at Xoom. “The Clear2Pay/Xoom remittance solution allows seamless deployment of a custom-tailored world class remittance service in a matter of months and at a fraction of the cost.”


About the Market for Remittance Services

By managing the complex distribution, technology and compliance requirements associated with global money transfer, turnkey solutions can level the playing field for retailers and banks alike, which have historically lacked the risk appetite and resources to participate in a global remittance market quickly approaching $300 billion," said Dan Schatt, senior analyst at Celent. "New players that adopt such platforms can also concentrate less on developing a distribution network and regulatory compliant software and more time on increasing customer satisfaction."
The international money transfer business has been one of the greatest beneficiaries of immigrant population growth. The free movement of people has resulted in $250 billion in remittances in 2005, and this figure is expected to grow 10 percent per year over the foreseeable future. Mexican immigrants alone send approximately $20 billion of their earnings to Mexico annually. The remittance market is very fragmented, however, with the biggest players, Western Union and Moneygram, accounting for less than 20 percent of the global market. (Source: CELENT)


About XOOM

Based in San Francisco, CA, Xoom has been operating a successful money transfer service since 2002. Consumers from all around the world use its disbursement network to send money to dozens of countries in the Americas, Africa, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. In addition to operating its own remittance service, Xoom is transforming the industry by making it easier for companies to build or expand their own international money transfer business. By taking care of the compliance, technology and distribution issues that make remittances so complex, Xoom helps banks compete when it comes to acquiring and cross-selling to immigrant customers, perhaps the fastest growing segment of the U.S. Xoom’s turnkey solution and network also help independent money transfer companies add additional locations or corridors and retailers increase traffic to their stores. www.xoomplatform.com


About Clear2Pay

Clear2Pay is an innovative payments technology company focused on delivering globally applicable solutions for secure, timely and streamlined payments processing. Clear2Pay's Open Payments Framework (OPF) enables financial institutions to improve internal payments processing efficiencies whilst at the same time provide their clients with better payment services that are faster, with richer payments related information. Clear2Pay's solutions within the Open Payments Framework (SOA) offer financial institutions the ability to process payments through a centralised payments engine that utilises a library of re-useable business services across all payment types. The bank can thus combine new services models with existing infrastructures, thereby protecting previous investments whilst gradually moving to a more modern efficient payments environment. Clients include financial institutions such as ING, SEB Kort, VISA, MasterCard, ABN AMRO, Nordea, DnB NOR, Abbey National, Fortis Bank, NAB, Krung Thai Bank, ANZ and a number of institutions in the Americas. Clear2Pay operates out of Belgium (HQ), the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, Spain, United Kingdom, United States, China, Australia and Singapore and currently employs over 200 staff. More information is available on www.clear2pay.com.


For more information:

Clear2Pay NV/SA
Conny Dorrestijn - VP Marketing and Communications
E:
P: +32 15 79 52 00
M: +31 651 067201