Category Archives: Financial Services

Rand Secure Archive Implements Hosted Archiving Solution for Ampersand Capital Partners

Rand Worldwide announced that their Rand Secure Archive division has implemented their proprietary hosted archiving and retrieval solution for Ampersand Capital Partners.

“As a private equity firm, Ampersand has to deal with a constantly evolving regulatory environment, including reporting requirements by the SEC, the impact of Sarbanes-Oxley and the Dodd-Frank Act,” says Rick Charpie, Ampersand’s founder. “To address those requirements we followed the advice that we always give to the CEOs we mentor – to select the best partners possible. That’s why we chose Rand Secure Archive, a partner who shares our commitment to success by delivering world-class technology and service.”

“In the financial services industry, it’s critical that electronic information and communication is both archived and easily retrievable – regardless of the file type or medium,” says Chris Grossman, vice president, Enterprise Applications at Rand Worldwide. “Our robust, hosted solution not only meets the legal requirements, but also offers robust functionality with simplicity and security.”

Key functional requirements for financial services organizations safeguarding their data include:

  • Preserve every electronic business record and store them securely.
  • Find and produce electronic communications quickly, and be prepared
    for SEC and other regulatory examinations or requests with on-demand
    data production for investment advisor compliance.
  • Enables the creation and enforcement of retention policies while
    maintaining a full audit trail to ensure compliance with these
    policies.
  • Offload the cost and operational burden of managing complex and
    disparate email and messaging platforms.

Compared to competitors, Rand Secure Archive provides faster, more advanced search capability and integrated eDiscovery tools, as well as more convenient user access to archived data.


i2c, KargoCard Partner for Prepaid, Mobile Payments, Loyalty Solutions in China

i2c, Inc., a payment processing technology company, and KargoCard, a Shanghai-based prepaid service provider, have partnered to deliver prepaid, mobile payment and loyalty solutions to merchants in China. i2c will provide payment processing services to enable KargoCard to offer a robust suite of products within China.

“KargoCard is an established leader in their market with a rapidly growing distribution network, strong management team and an impressive client list,” said Amir Wain, CEO of i2c. “Their drive to revolutionize the Chinese payments industry aligns perfectly with i2c’s commitment to bring innovation to global payments.”

In a recent report by Mercator Advisory Group, China was estimated to be the world’s largest prepaid market in terms of market potential. With several high-profile clients like Beard Papa, Happy Lemon and Cloud Nine, KargoCard is set to grow exponentially in this market. To support KargoCard and i2c’s growing presence in the Asia-Pacific region, i2c is building out a new data center in Shanghai.

“Our tremendous growth and aggressive expansion plans require an established processing platform that offers superior flexibility and scalability. i2c’s platform provides this, as well as a rich feature set that will allow us to better serve our customers,” said KargoCard CEO David Suzuki.


Plextek, RedCloud Acquire Iceni Mobile Payments System

Plextek Limited, a product innovation and design consultancy and RedCloud Technology Limited, an investor in mobile financial services in emerging markets, today announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the Intellectual Property Rights of Iceni Mobile Ltd including the mobile payments system (the I2S platform) developed by the same team that brought the world’s most successful mobile money service, M-PESA, to market.

The acquisition signifies both Plextek’s and RedCloud’s commitment to the mobile money market. With the founding team, the companies plan to deliver the technology as a platform as a service and create a new way in which mobile money and associated services are taken to market.

“Plextek and RedCloud share a vision for extending the mobile payments value chain to transform the way in which financial services are launched in emerging markets,” said Ian Murphy, Technical Director and Founder of Plextek. “The next generation of mobile payments technology is about leveraging the power of secure cloud computing platforms; it’s about a fundamentally better way to recruit, manage and empower banks to deliver mobile financial services.”

“Our cloud financial services investment strategy is accelerating, and is at the root of the broad-based transformation and innovation we are seeing from customers today,” said Justin Floyd, Founding Partner of RedCloud. “The launch of the Platform as a Service model revolutionizes mobile payments through banks and mobile operators in emerging markets. It’s an important step to making technology available at a lower cost of ownership to those that need it most.”

“We are set to transform the way in which mobile money technology is delivered to financial organizations,” added Warren Carew, one of the founders of Iceni. “Traditional mobile payment software that many financial organizations use today was designed to work in an offline world. Platform as a Service will remove barriers to entry for future providers allowing them to accelerate their entry to market.”

Iceni’s core services provide robust authentication solutions for web access and mobile solutions designed for un-banked populations over multiple service channels. The services include proximity and remote payment services such as in-store or online mobile payment, money transfer, and more. The I2S platform enables banks, payment service providers, and telecom operators to offer accessible and secure financial services to anyone with a phone.