HP and mpct to Jointly Market New Intelligent Electronic-Funds-Transfer Solution

Edge: Work-Group Computing Report, Sept 20, 1999

Hewlett-Packard Company Monday announced a global alliance with mpct Solutions Corporation to market and sell e-FT, an electronic-funds-transfer solution for high-value, high-volume international payments. This solution is the first in a series of corporate banking applications ported to the HP-UX(1) and Windows NT operating systems. HP and mpct will demonstrate the solution here at SIBOS, S.W.I.F.T.'s International Banking Operations Seminar, through Sept. 17.

e-FT automates the processing of fund transfers end-to-end, enabling financial institutions to reduce manual processing, achieve greater operational efficiency and benefit from shorter settlement times. The ability to settle transactions faster also helps reduce operational risk and improve customer service.

By running e-FT on the HP-UX operating system with MC/ServiceGuard, mpct further strengthens its reputation for providing mission-critical software on highly available systems. MC/ServiceGuard, HP's industry-leading high-availability clustering software, with more than 30,000 licenses worldwide, enables banking customers to achieve maximum uptime for their business processes, even in the event of system failure. e-FT also runs on HP's servers that are based on NT. An Oracle, Sybase or MS-SQL relational database is used to store the transaction data.

"The shaking out of the banking market following the introduction of the euro in January 1999 has led to many changes in correspondent banking and in the whole area of clearing and settlement," said Pat Hayward, partner, mpct Solutions Corporation. "In order to keep pace with these changes, banks need a very flexible, intelligent routing engine that can be automatically adjusted to reflect new payment rules and instructions. e-FT gives them that capability.

"We are delighted to partner with HP to deliver the e-FT solution. HP is recognized worldwide for the quality and stability of its solutions. Working with HP will enable us to extend our reach outside the main financial centres in Europe and North America, to service customers across the globe."

"HP is committed to delivering robust, best-of-breed applications to the financial-services industry and works closely with channel partners to offer the most comprehensive, fully integrated solutions," said Olivier Trancart, general manager of HP's E-Financial Services Business Unit. "mpct is a dynamic and forward-looking company; we are delighted to work with them in the area of electronic funds transfer."

mpct Solutions Corporation was founded in 1981 to respond to the dramatic changes taking place in the financial industry. Since its inception, mpct Solutions has built and installed the industry's most sophisticated transaction processing systems for financial institutions around the globe.

mpct Solutions employs some 350 professionals worldwide. For more information about mpct visit: http://www.mpct.com

Hewlett-Packard Company -- a leading global provider of computing and imaging solutions and services for business and home -- is focused on capitalizing on the opportunities of the Internet and the proliferation of electronic services.

HP plans to launch Agilent Technologies as an independent company by mid-calendar 2000. Agilent consists of HP's test and measurement, semiconductor products, chemical analysis and healthcare solutions businesses, and has leading positions in multiple market segments.

HP has 123,500 employees worldwide and had total revenue of $47.1 billion in its 1998 fiscal year. Information about HP, its products and the company's Year 2000 program can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.hp.com.

(1) HP-UX Release 10.20 and later and HP-UX Release 11.00 and later (in both 32- and 64-bit configurations) on all HP 9000 computers are Open Group UNIX 95 branded products.