The Bank, BPC's second client in Azerbaijan and the sixth in the Caucasian region, is now in a position to bring new products to market faster, deliver outstanding service to its customers and dramatically lower TCO.

Previously, Bank of Baku was relying on an outsourced solution, which lacked the ability to support competitive products or get them to market in a timely fashion. SmartVista gives the Bank total control of its entire payment business, from developing new card products, delivering additional features to its credit card holders and managing its ATM network. Bank of Baku has also licensed SmartGuard, BPC's award winning fraud prevention solution that monitors 100% of on-line transactions to provide a highly effective tool in the continuing fight against payment related fraud.

Bank of Baku, one of the largest retail banks in the region is planning to grow its card base to 500,000 cards in the next two years. With BPC's help Bank of Baku quickly and easily passed EMV certification and can now issue chip cards as part of its overall fraud prevention strategy. Today the Bank can now offer the full range of MasterCard and Visa products to its customers.

The Bank also has aggressive plans to enlarge its branch, ATM and 24/7 kiosk networks in Azerbaijan, and will use one of the SmartVista suite of products, SmartATM to provide sophisticated ATM network management. Among SmartATM's many benefits, is the ability to optimize cash holdings in the individual ATMs maximizing service availability while also reducing the operational cost associated with holding surplus cash.

Nahid Zeynalov, Head of Payment Systems and İT department, highlighted the Bank's strategy of continually moving closer to the customer: "Over the last few years we have been working towards achieving maximum convenience for our clients. Now having selected SmartVista we are confident in being able to increase our levels of customer service and choice. BPC provided us with a robust payments infrastructure able to support our business over the long term."

"We are proud to partner with Bank of Baku - one of the most ambitious and innovative banks in the country. BPC has built a strong presence in the Caucasian region, which has been a key element in the modernization of the region's payment infrastructure. With SmartVista now live, Bank of Baku can look forward to growing its card business while greatly improving customer service, product innovation," added Vasily Grigoriev, CEO BPC Banking Technologies.