The deal is to be officially signed today at the King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology (KACST) in the presence of Lord Green, Minister of State for Trade and Investment, Lord Deighton, Commercial Secretary to Her Majesty's Treasury, His Excellency Dr. Mohammed Ibn Ibrahim Al-Suwaiyel, President of KACST, and His Highness, Dr Prince Turki Bin Saud Al Mohammed Al Saud, Vice President of Research Institutes, KACST.

Ixaris Payments Server is a cloud-based platform that enables financial institutions to implement their own prepaid card programs with minimal time and effort. Dedicated to the creation of an electronic payments system in Saudi Arabia, with potential to extend it to the Gulf Co-operation Council (GCC) states and across the Middle East, 3omlti has adopted the Ixaris solution to give its offering the international component that will enable it to achieve this aim.

Ixaris Payments Server will enable 3omlti to establish online payment accounts for both banked and unbanked users who want greater privacy and safety for online transactions; as well as allow them to establish a global money remittance service for sending funds abroad. These additional components will play an integral role in helping 3omlti to build its payments ecosystem.

The payments market in the Middle East is undergoing rapid development. The demand for electronic payments - both for online purchases as well as for remittances - in the GCC, of which Saudi Arabia is the largest and most influential member, is undisputed.

Remittance payments total more than $60bn each year, with approximately 15 million foreign workers who send a large share of their income home. For Saudi Arabia alone, remittance volumes are expected to reach up to $35bn by 2015, and a total of $80bn for the GCC as a whole[1].

Lord Green, Minister of State for Trade and Investment, said, "Ixaris and 3omlti's partnership is a prime example of how innovative firms in the UK and Saudi Arabia are working together for mutual benefit. The UK and Saudi Arabia has enjoyed long-standing business and investment ties, and we look forward to further strengthening our relationship."

Alex Mifsud, Founder and CEO, Ixaris, added, "We are incredibly excited to be working with such an innovative financial player within the Middle East's booming payments market. This move is synonymous with Ixaris' wider mission to spur innovation in electronic commerce on a global scale. In emerging countries in particular, Ixaris Payments Server allows banks to embrace the new era of the payments ecosystem. The platform's ready-built, market-tested apps mean that the offering is comprehensively customisable to the needs of banks and their corporate clients. What's more, the solution's unique ability to 'evolve as you go' means that regulation becomes less of an encumbering issue."

Eng. Khalid Al Holan, Founder and CEO, 3omlti e-Commerce, stated: "We are very pleased to have reached this agreement that aims at developing the payment services in the Middle East and the transfer of digital payment card technology in an exclusive partnership between Ixaris and 3omlti, so that it would become an excellent electronic payment portal that simplifies purchasing processes all over the world by linking it to the international payment network. This agreement is a unique opportunity to enhance electronic payments through 3omlti that also allows its clients to benefit from Visa and MasterCard (Pay o p s) advantages since it is the first company that uses this service in the region."