eCompany announced today that it has signed an agreement making Nedbank the exclusive distributor in South Africa for its Internet Payments software package, iVeri. Nedbank`s Card Acquiring business, NedLink, currently uses iVeri to process all of its Internet credit card transactions.
iVeri, a proprietary eCompany product, serves as an Internet "Point-of-Sale" device, ensuring that credit card transactions are processed risk-free over the Internet thereby enabling merchants to accept credit card payments online.
While Nedbank has acquired the rights to distribute iVeri in South Africa, other banks may gain access to the product as sub-licencees of Nedbank. iVeri`s potential with financial institutions is huge given the level of security supplied by the product. Since its launch in 1998, iVeri has proved itself to be efficient, robust and secure.
eCompany`s CEO, Sheldon Cohen says, "eCompany`s key differentiator has always been our focus on e-commerce platforms and our payment technology platform, iVeri, will facilitate Nedbank`s e-commerce capability. Nedbank was the obvious choice to distribute iVeri. It provides eCompany with a strong and reputable financial institution as well as an immediate customer base to maximise the potential of iVeri."
"iVeri is a good example of a product that adds value to Microsoft`s Electronic Commerce platform," says Mark Berman, Principal Technology Strategist in the DOTcom Group at Microsoft South Africa. "eCompany definitely has the right strategy in mind, making it easy for developers to integrate online credit card payment into their sites, with fixed monthly fees that are affordable to anyone wanting to add payment to their sites, while keeping the transactions secure".
Jack Trevena, General Manager, NedLink says, "Our alliance with eCompany strongly supports NedLink`s strategy of managed payments solutions, as iVeri provides NedLink with generic or custom-built solutions to on-line card payments. eCompany`s expertise and resources will assist NedLink in gaining Internet payments market share and enable us to explore opportunities for further development in the area of payments."
iVeri encrypts the transaction data at the point of sale, preventing it from being tampered with during its transfer to the point of authorisation (ie: the bank which issued the card). iVeri then decrypts the information at the financial institution, where credit verification is carried out, before the information is re-encrypted and re-sent to the point of sale, authorising the relevant transaction.
"On-line transaction security is obviously critical for Nedbank and iVeri uses tried and tested encryption to reasonably secure our clients` transactions," says Trevena.
iVeri software is flexible, providing for different applications. iVeri is used as a method of secure credit card payment by Firstpark at the Johannesburg International Airport, as well as by Sun International in its Central Reservations facility. iVeri has also been licensed internationally for distribution in the United States.
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