Such areas include rolling out IFX standardization, operating ATM networks in a managed services environment and delivering a service-oriented architecture for ATMs in a "Net Centric" environment.

ACI and Wincor Nixdorf share a long, successful partnership in delivering end to end multi-vendor solutions into customer environments. With the companies commitment to adopt and embrace industry standards, three strategic areas of joint development, sales and delivery services have been selected as the stepping stones for tightening this relationship. The joint goal is to provide solutions that are more flexible, cost effective and easier to integrate into existing environments in order to provide banking customers more value add services at the ATM.

Both companies will continue to leverage early international successes of IFX based solutions to the broader financial services community. Wincor Nixdorf's ProCash IFX together with ACI's BASE24-es, implementing the IFX 1.7 specifications, has been currently released to a joint customer project. Direct links between the core development teams ensure also the quality and the productizing of future version of the respective IFX solution components.

"With Wincor Nixdorf's expertise in driving open software standards in heterogeneous multi-vendor networks and ACI's commitment to leverage standards in financial transaction services we strongly believe that we can bring the enormous benefits of IFX into today's ATM world," said Mark Vipond, product group president of ACI Worldwide.

Wincor Nixdorf has established a "eServices Platform" to operate complete ATM networks, including all surrounding business and logistical processes. ACI's BASE24-es has been selected as the foundation for the handling of the financial transaction services. Wincor Nixdorf's unique eServices platform is designed to operate multiple ATM and Client-Server networks.

"The proven track record of BASE24 was a key decision point to cooperate with ACI in this business segment," said Andreas Vogt, director OES of Wincor Nixdorf Services Division. "The growing demand for "Managed Services" offerings in the ATM market segment will further boost the business and technology relationship between the two companies."

"Currently ACI and Wincor Nixdorf product teams are working to provide a roadmap for a next generation solution blueprint combining PC/E and BASE24-es services," said Reinhard Rabenstein Wincor Nixdorf CTO and member of the executive board. "The goal is to disclose a more detailed announcement around this joint initiative during "Wincor World", Wincor Nixdorf's next annual customer event."

ACI Worldwide also announced the extension of its partnership with MasterCard to fully support a range of OneSMART applications. As a member of the MasterCard Smart Vendor Programme, ACI has worked closely with MasterCard to support MasterCard's entire OneSMART product suite.

ACI is a pioneer of instant card issuance of OneSMART cards, having first introduced this capability using its ACI Smart Chip Manager solution at Cartes last year. Since then, the capabilities of this solution have been dramatically extended to support MasterCard's OneSMART suite of solutions. Through Smart Chip Manager, users manage all the applications on a single card.

The applications being supported this year are:

• OneSMART Authentication
• OneSMART Pre-Authorised
• OneSMART PayPass
• OneSMART MODS (MasterCard Open Data Storage)
• OneSMART PPSE (PayPass Selection Environment
• Ticketing application

"We see our relationship with MasterCard as being a fundamental part of our business strategy," said Richard Launder, president of ACI Worldwide EMEA. "By working closely with MasterCard we are able to offer our customers the ability to deploy all of these innovative OneSMART suite solutions, built upon the EMV infrastructure. It is clear to see that as opportunities and interest in the instant card issuance of these applications grow within the industry, ACI is well positioned to deliver via our industry-leading expertise and global reach."

Separately, ACI Worldwide today announced that it has formed a strategic e-ID business unit, headed up by Cath Rawcliffe, to focus on the rapidly evolving ID card market. ACI has nearly 10 years experience of smart card migration alone and has implemented projects in both government and banking environments.

With 30 years of international experience in the banking world where user identification has always been a predominant issue, ACI recognises the importance of offering tailor made and future proofed services that match country specific requirements. One recent example which illustrates ACI’s flexible and scalable approach to ID cards, is the Hong Kong smart ID card project.

The Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) chose ACI Smart Chip Manager to manage the issuing and further life-cycle of its new smart ID card, and to add additional functionality to the card in the future, e.g. voter registration and driving license. This smart ID card also acts as an eCert card enabling Hong Kong residents to use it for government and commercial services. The mass issuance of cards started in August 2003 and to date over four million cards have been issued, by August 2007 all seven million will be issued. Following the success of this project, ACI will soon be announcing a major new Middle East ID Card project.

Rainier Brueren, managing director and VP of the ACI smart card division said: "The role of smart cards as an enabler of electronic ID is clearly apparent. This is an area where ACI has repeatedly demonstrated its expertise. Our establishment of the e-ID business unit further strengthens our commitment to providing the most advanced smart card based ID solutions."

Richard Launder, president ACI Worldwide EMEA, said: "The key to our success in this area is our global coverage, local offices, and experience in secure card and token management and transaction processing over the last 30 years."