SWIFT to develop solutions targeting Online Payment industry

Taking on the global leaders in the financial industry, SWIFT has announced its ambition to conquer the Account-to-Account and Business-to-Business banking transactions market. The official announcement was made on March 12, 2020, by the board of directors after a long preparation period. This ambitious project is one of the largest ventures the company has undertaken since its creation in the 1970s.

In a sector in full transformation heading straight to a completely digitalized and ultra-fast world, this new approach by the SWIFT is far from being an exception. Many old dinosaurs of the financial world such as Visa and Mastercard are also pursuing the same objectives, by modernizing their services, or by investing enormous resources in startups like Mastercard’s Pay by Bank. With, the objective to develop new technologies that will allow them to stay in the race.

What are the challenges ahead?

SWIFT aims to provide a global end-to-end payment solution in the coming years. The new solution will allow a frictionless and instant flaw of transactions between two accounts (Account-to-Account & Business-to-Business) regardless of their locations on the globe. With this ambitious project, the company hopes to:

Conquer the online banking sector and provide a reliable solution for B2B transactions.

Tackle the market of personal finance management.

Solidify its position as a leader of B2B payments protocol provider, for major banking institutions.

However, it is important to emphasize that this will not be a simple walk in the park. There are already several successful fintech companies providing these types of solutions. With that being said, SWIFT will have to first make up for the years of delay and prove its creativity by offering a product good enough to compete with solutions already present in the market.

According to a study by Deloitte Center, the fintech sector is one of the most innovative industries of the last two decades with thousands of new companies, startups and derivative solutions created every month around the world.

The new face of the European online payment market.

The current technologies and solutions in the market

Since the liberalization of the online payment market in the early 2000s, there are today thousands of fintech companies worldwide in all sizes and all sectors. Some of these companies have turned into large financial institutions competing with global banks, such as PayPal, Wepay, 2Checkout, and Neteller.

However, there are today companies like Coinbase, Venmo, Suplari, Transferwise, Trustly which are in full transformation, and each one with the potential to make a real impact on the market.

Different use and application for new payment solutions

From its beginnings, these new solutions have enjoyed enormous success with personal users, the eCommerce merchants, and B2B service providers. However, one of the sectors to have benefited the most from this race for new payment technology is the online gaming industry.

The Swedish fintech company Trustly AB has developed the Pay n Play solution which allows casino players to replace the username and password with their bank identifications. With Pay and Play, players use their BankIds or bank credentials to register and make deposits to online casinos in less than 5 clicks, and safely.

There are many other applications for these new technologies. Suplari, is a company based in Seattle which uses advanced machine learning to help users optimize their finances. Billtrust provides a service that automates bill payments for large and medium companies.