Atos Origin and Integri partner in new European payment standard testing

Companies realize need for compliance testing to the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) initiative and offer combined test solution to Belgian financial institutions

7 May 2008, Brussels – Atos Origin, a global Information Technology (IT) services company, and Integri, leading provider of test tools and services for payment, ticketing and mobile applications, announce a partnership for providing a complete SEPA test service to Belgian banks. This service will allow banks to test their system for compliance with the SEPA Credit Transfer and Direct Debit requirements followed by Card Transactions in the near future.

With the introduction of the SEPA initiative, all electronic payments in Europe will be considered as a single domestic payments market making payment transactions easy and more efficient for bank customers. The new directive, however, increases the complexity of a bank’s ICT operations. It is a critical task to reach compliance to the new directive rapidly as it impacts their payment products as well as the electronic processes that run in the back office.

The partnership enables all Belgian banks to test their conformance to this new European standard with an integrated solution for credit transfer, direct debit and card transactions. Integri will supply all test technology and related know-how for file transfers both for customer-to-bank and bank-to-bank transactions. Atos Origin will deliver the necessary services to support the bank with the actual field implementation of the test plan, including consulting and technical services. Depending on the specific needs of each financial institution, the joint offer can be customized.

Mr André Geunens, Marketing Director at Atos Origin commented: “Testing technology is a part of our core business. With this offer, we aim at allowing banks to gain a considerable amount of money and to shorten the time of bringing a solution to the market. This partnership is established to help banks with the complex migration, reduce time-to-market of products and improve general quality levels.”

Mr Jan De Meester, CEO at Integri said: “It is great to be part of the design of a new payments environment.” Mr De Meester added: “Building on 15 years of experience in transactional payments software testing, we are committed to offer – together with our partner - a comprehensive solution for a successful high quality implementation of this ambitious Europroject.”

About Integri
Integri specialises in test tools and test services for payment, ticketing and mobile applications. Alongside the open INQ platform, Integri offers a number of dedicated platforms for specific applications, each with a number of Off-the-Shelf Test Suites. These test suites are fully prepared solutions that include simulation and test scripts and are based on international open standards. Integri employs 45 staff, has +150 customers and sold +2000 licenses in 35 countries since its inception in 1992. Integri is located in Belgium, France and the US. Integri’s clients are mainly financial institutions, smartcard manufacturers, terminal manufacturers, ticketing operators, mobile operators and system integrators active in e- or m-business.

Integri is a wholly owned, autonomous business unit of Clear2Pay, an international financial technology company focused on delivering globally applicable solutions for secure, timely electronic payments. Clear2Pay’s operates from 13 international offices and currently employs over 400 staff.

More information on www.integri.com and www.clear2pay.com

About Atos Origin
Atos Origin is one of the world’s leading international information technology services companies. Its business is turning client vision into results through the application of consulting, systems integration and managed operations. The company’s annual revenues total more than €5.8 billion and it employs over 50,000 people in 40 countries. Atos Origin is the Worldwide Information Technology Partner for the Olympic Games and has a client base of international blue-chip companies across all sectors. Atos Origin is listed on the Paris Eurolist Market and trades as Atos Origin, Atos Worldline and Atos Consulting.

More information about Atos Origin is available under www.atosorigin.com

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Media contact:

Integri
Steve Lacourt
E:
P: +32 2 717 69 00

Atos Origin
Vera Luypaert
E:
P: +32 475 77 11 11