R07 marks the general availability of Temenos' ARC front office product as part of T24, providing clients with front to back office functionality within a single integrated environment. Specifically designed for the banking market, ARC is built on a multi-channel architecture and includes modules for operational and analytical CRM, process workflow and channel banking.

Announced in June 2006, ARC has so far been available to new clients as part of a phased launch. Now available to all clients, ARC enables banks to effectively manage their customer relationships and includes campaign management tools and a new propensity engine to identify cross-selling opportunities. The system includes full branch and teller architecture, with open connectivity to self-service channels such as ATM.

By investing around 20% of its revenues in research and development, higher than the average of its industry peers, Temenos continually delivers the latest technology and with R07, clients can now access over 100 specific functional improvements. Mark Gunning, group strategy director, Temenos, says: "We roll out annual releases in a controlled way as part of our commitment to provide ongoing support. Clients don't need to purchase specific upgrades and instead we deliver the latest functionality with each release. With R07, they can benefit from all the features of previous versions along with new capabilities to keep them at the forefront of the market."

Key enhancements in R07 include:

• The latest generation of Temenos' Service-Orientated Architecture (SOA). The new version of the web services tool further automates the deployment of T24's user-defined and system-wide services on a web services platform, removing the need for any deep or specific technical knowledge;
  
• Improved retail lending, particularly in the area of credit card processing;
  
• A mutual funds and investor services module to enable fund managers, retail banks and other fund distributors to fuully support this business line within T24;
  
• Upgraded off-line branch processing to provide seamless automation when communications are disrupted;
  
• Additional localised functionality to support the Japanese market;
  
• An upgraded asset management module to support corporate asset management, private banking and wealth management;
  
• Additional support for Microsoft SQL Server 2005, and compatibility with Microsoft® BizTalk® Server 2006 and Microsoft BizTalk Accelerator for SWIFT;
  
• Full support for IBM DB2® 9, enabling customers to benefit from the data server's pureXML™ capabilities, maximising data storage capabilities for both XML and relational data.

The announcement is made on the second day of the Temenos client forum in Bangkok, which brings together some 500 delegates, including worldwide bankers, key investors and industry analysts. The event is sponsored by Temenos' key partners HP, Oracle, IBM and Validata, each of them bringing an extra level of technical expertise and support to clients' implementations.

Andreas Andreades, CEO, Temenos, adds: "We have a consistent policy to invest substantially in our technology and provide a fully upgradeable annual release and this sets us apart in today's core banking market. As such, we protect and future-proof clients' investment in T24 and remove the single biggest risk that banks face, that of technology obsolescence. Legacy applications and custom written developments often fail after only a few years due to the lack of an upgrade path. In the past 14 years, we've proven it's possible to remain up-to-date while maintaining an acceptable cost of ownership. R07 is a particularly significant release for us in that ARC is now generally available to all customers, delivering on our commitment to help the front office achieve maximum ROI across multiple channels."

Temenos has an international client-base of over 580 financial institutions and continues to attract global tier 1 and regional banks as a result of its superior products, T24 and Temenos CoreBanking.