Sema Group has launched a new payment card issuing and merchant management system dubbed Essentis and named the UK's Alliance & Leicester as the first customer for the service.
For Alliance & Leicester, the switch to the client/server based Essentis platform is expected to deliver greater control of customer data, full integration capability with external systems, an e-compliant platform in line with EU regulations and support of EMV chip card standards.
Alliance & Leicester has over one million credit cards in circulation and has been a card processing customer of Sema Group since 1986. Peter McNamara, A&L managing director, says the new system will enable the group to expand its product portfolio and significantly reduce time to market.
Sema currently has over 200 customers worldwide using its card processing solutions.