eFunds Corporation, a leading provider of risk management, electronic payments and global outsourcing solutions, today announced the launch of a high-availability, low-cost transaction switching solution on the Linux operating system.
The new solution, IST/Switch for IBM Linux on POWER Systems, is now immediately available on a worldwide basis.
eFunds IST/Switch for IBM Linux on IBM POWER Systems offers a low-cost, high-performance and high-availability solution for mid-range payment transaction switching. The solution is ideal for small-to-midsized financial institutions and merchant acquirers/ISOs looking to reduce the maintenance costs of expensive proprietary systems, as well as larger institutions seeking more cost-conscious solutions capable of supporting future transaction volume growth. In addition, IST/Switch enables customers to modernize their payments infrastructure on an open platform to reduce ongoing IT costs and protect future investments. Customers who process most of their business functions in-house except payments due to complexity and cost, now have a low-cost, easy-to-deploy in-house alternative.
Working together through the IBM PartnerWorld Industry Network, eFunds and IBM have collaborated to build and validate the new solution for IBM servers, storage and middleware. The solution infrastructure consists of an IBM servers such as System p5 Express or IBM eServer OpenPower, Linux OS-tuned systems equipped with enterprise-class IBM POWER5 processors and mainframe-inspired reliability, availability and scalability (RAS) capabilities, IBM TotalStorage expandable storage systems, IBM DB2 Universal Database (DB2 UDB), IBM High Availability Disaster Recovery (HADR), Automatic Client Reroute (ACR) and Tivoli System Automation for Multiplatforms (TSA), a fully functional high-availability software product.
The solution infrastructure has been pre-tested in a variety of configurations with the eFunds IST/Switch product set designed to acquire, process, authorize, clear and settle credit/debit card payment transactions from any touch point, across any network. IST/Switch, eFunds' open, UNIX-based transaction switch, is part of the CONNEX Open Enterprise next-generation payments platform. IST/Switch is currently installed at more than 150 customer locations worldwide, and also runs on IBM AIX.
"The IST/Switch on Linux offering further expands eFunds' available payment processing solutions on the widest range of open and enterprise platforms in the industry," said Rahul Gupta, senior vice president and division executive, eFunds Corporation. "We're excited to be members of the PartnerWorld Industry Network. This program will allow us to leverage IBM's leadership and resources to develop the innovative solutions our customers are demanding to drive down the cost of running highly available payment processing operations."