Hong Kong-based Bank of East Asia (BEA) has purchased technology from Belgian payment system provider Clear2Pay that will enable it to connect to the People's Bank of China's Electronic Commercial Draft System (ECDS).
The ECDS initiative was launched by the central bank in order to standardise all letter of credit or commercial draft agreements in an electronic format and it requires all banks operating in China to connect over the next few years.
Once the implementation is completed, Bank of East Asia will be connecting all of its corporate customers to the ECDs network, giving them visibility of ongoing trade, cash and payments-based transactions.
The system supplied by Clear2Pay will cover the functionality required by BEA, such as the buy-in, sell-out, buy-back, issuance, remittance and discounting of commercial drafts.
"This system will enhance the products and services that we provide for our corporate customers," says a BEA spokesman. "It will also help us to promote our image in the Chinese banking industry by reaping the strong market share of ECDS."
The BEA announcement was made at the Sibos banking conference in Hong Kong. On show at this year's event, Clear2Pay is also exhibiting a new range of mobile banking products. The PocketBanking suite of services is based on its Open Payment Framework and enables users to access their bank accounts and carry out transactions on an iPhone or any other 'smart'phone.
Says Mark Hartley, vice president, global strategy and CMO for Clear2Pay: "Mobile banking has turned from 'nice to have' to a deep and rich offering whereby mobile banking services can be integrated with payments, reporting and online banking systems."