"Softjourn’s ongoing support is an important part of our success. We value their partnership in helping us address the complex software and technology needed to operate a world-class business."
UPC: The True Value of Maintaining and Enhancing UPC's Operations
ABOUT THE CLIENT:
CHALLENGE:
UPC partnered with Softjourn to augment its in-house technical teams to provide incremental technical support and project-specific expertise to address UPC’s required internal upgrades, new product enablement and process improvement.
SOLUTION:
A team of dedicated developers was created to work with UPC. Softjourn’s staff dedicated to UPC is largely focused on maintaining and continually enhancing UPC’s ATM and POS systems, mobile banking app, and e-commerce gateways to Mastercard and Visa.
RESULT:
The result of our collaboration with UPC are:
- Upgraded software that optimizes UPC's network of ATMs
- New e-commerce gateway
- updated mobile banking application
- updated ATM and POS systems
About the Project
UPC is part of the Raiffeisen Bank International AG Group (Austria). UPC offers processing services and e-commerce services, as well as provides ATM support and develops payment solutions for banks.
Our collaboration with UPC started in 2009 when UPC asked Softjourn for assistance as part of its systemwide server upgrade. Putting a critical function in the hands of a third party involved some risks, but due to Softjourn's experience in the financial domain and through steady delivery, it has become UPC's most trusted partner. After that, our next big project was to build a mobile banking application that UPC will offer to 60+ banks and member institutions.
With a diverse client base working hard to stabilize the banking environment and build trust among a consumer population that historically has been skeptical of financial institutions, UPC is at the forefront of helping its clients restructure and transition.
This includes introducing financial services that are fast, reliable and convenient for consumers and upgrading operational capabilities to increase its clients’ efficiency and cost-effectiveness, while minimizing risk and achieving regulatory compliance. It also includes applying current technology and standards to keep clients’ services and capabilities aligned with the international payments community.
The Solution
UPC partnered with Softjourn to augment its in-house technical teams and provide incremental technical support and bring project-specific expertise. The team had to address:
- UPC’s required internal upgrades
- mobile banking app for Andorid
- new product enablement
- internal process improvements
Softjourn’s staff dedicated to UPC is largely focused on maintaining and continually enhancing UPC’s critical Unix-based TPII system, which transmits authorization validation data among issuers, acquirers, and ATMs and POS terminals driven by UPC. TPII is the core of UPC’s operation, touching every transaction that flows through the processing center. During the past few years, the Softjourn TPII team’s most significant enhancements to the system have included mobile banking apps and e-commerce gateways to Mastercard and Visa.
Recognizing the importance of uninterrupted support for its clients’ ongoing business operations, UPC also needed to validate that its upgraded servers could handle any transaction volume under any set of variable conditions they might encounter in production. Softjourn built a simulator to stress test the upgraded servers. The simulator subjected the servers to activity and conditions significantly more challenging than they might face in live operation. And it supported UPC in making a seamless server transition with zero downtime for clients.
Card Processing System Update
Since 2009, Softjourn has maintained and continually enhanced UPC’s critical TPII system, a Unix-based transaction and card processing system that transmits authorization validation data among issuers, acquirers, and ATMs and POS terminals that UPC drives. Among other things, TPII handles authorizing transactions performed by UPC clients’ customers; sending international transaction requests to Mastercard, Visa or other processing hosts for authorization; updating payment network requirements to support new features and services; and message routing, currency conversion, user credential checking and transaction logging—from terminals, networks, and hosts using different message formats.
Mobile Banking Application
UPC had already developed an SMS-banking solution called Mobi&Card, so Softjourn’s task was to develop smartphone applications that would communicate with the Mobi&Card server. We kicked off with Android, as the most popular platform in Ukraine. To enable banking operations, our first solutions included cash-flow monitoring, checking account balances, blocking cards that had been stolen, requesting a change in card limits for online transactions, and more.
Conclusion
The joint efforts on maintenance and new product development allowed UPC to grow and increase its user base. With new products that offer a secure way to handle payments, they've attracted the attention of new clients as well as other banks that wanted to improve their services.