Changes in banks’ regulatory capital requirements for businesses are leading banks to exit or downsize lines of business and increase the focus on other lines of business. Payments is an area where banks and non-banks are significantly increasing their commitments. Over the next five years the payments industry will change its entire shape, structure, and offerings. In the past, the complexi[...]

In his latest monthly newsletter, U.K. money-saving guru Martin Lewis gives his readers advice on how to make money from filling in online surveys. I rather like his opening line, which reads “Willing to give views on One Direction, washing-up liquid or what goes on between your bedsheets? If so, it's possible to earn £100s a year, without any special skill or talent.” Of [...]

It’s fair to say that in today’s sourcing marketplace there’s a degree of disenchantment, even cynicism, regarding analyst firms and their ability to deliver genuine business value. Look around and you’ll see no shortage of swipes aimed at the hegemony of the big traditional firms, whose grip on the influencer market and their ‘pay to play’ models, have caused m[...]

Visa has announced it is assessing whether to sell its investment in mobile payment software developer and transactions processor Monitise. Visa formed an alliance with Monitise in 2009 to provide Visa with mobile platform development services. The agreement runs through 2016. As part of the agreement, Visa made a capital investment in Monitise and received 14.4% of the company's equity. Ov[...]

Cognizant is to acquire TriZetto, a healthcare ISV in the U.S., for $2.7bn in cash. TriZetto has a headcount of 3.7k (Cognizant at end of H1 2014: 187k.4). In its last 12 months, TriZetto had $711m in revenues and a non-GAAP operating margin of 18.4% (Cognizant in 2013: 20.6%). TriZetto LTM revenues breakdown by service/product line is: Payer software: 40% (~$277m) Consulting: 23% (~[...]

IBM has patented a technique to allow users to dynamically choose or change the location where public and private cloud data is stored.This is clearly a very important development in legitimizing cloud use for production applications, where country and industry regulators can take a very strong view on the geographies in which data, particularly customer data, can be stored. Potentially th[...]

Mastercard and Visa are taking very different approaches to the payments market, resulting in very different operating outcomes. Mastercard is focusing on growth in emerging markets and merchant acquiring (especially consulting services for merchants); Visa is pursuing mature markets with aggressive cost control and sales incentives to drive revenue growth.  Top line results for [...]

Sopra and CS Communication & Systèmes, a French IT services vendor, have announced a multi-tiered agreement: CS is to proceed to a €12m convertible bond issuance (maturity 5 years, conversion price per share: €3.6; interest rate: 4%; delivery: July 2014). As part of this issuance, Sopra agreed with DUNA & Cie, th[...]

TrueBlue announced on Monday it is to acquire U.S. based RPO and MSP provider SeatonCorp. TrueBlue is a specialist staffing organization that supports staffing and also provides onsite management services which will complement the RPO, MSP services of SeatonCorp. The SeatonCorp business beng acquired includes its:  RPO businesses: PeopleScout (U.S based)&nb[...]

Last week, MphasiS announced the launch of its next generation Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRS) service, in partnership with legal process outsourcing (LPO) provider Mindcrest, to its North American BFSI client base. Services within the scope of the offering include: Contract remediation Document review Consent order fulfillment Corporate compliance research. MphasiS will [...]

Last week, MphasiS announced the launch of its next generation Governance, Risk and Compliance (GRS) service, in partnership with legal process outsourcing (LPO) provider Mindcrest, to its North American BFSI client base. Services within the scope of the offering include: Contract remediation Document review Consent order fulfillment Corporate compliance research. MphasiS will [...]