Consumers in China will soon be able to
use their payment cards to purchase directly from internet-based
European retailers thanks to a co-operation agreement between
Ireland-headquartered payments processor Rahaxi and ChinaPay, the
online payment unit of China’s only card organisation, China
UnionPay (CUP). Rahaxi’s payments platform will facilitate online,
real-time processing and dynamic currency conversion.

“Rahaxi is taking the lead as the only service provider with
this offering,” said Rahaxi’s global sales director, Paul Warren.
“We anticipate Rahaxi will experience substantial growth through
this strategic agreement.”

Rahaxi plans to market the product in Europe to its direct
merchants, online retail service providers and its partner
banks.

ChinaPay’s GM XiaoFeng Li praised Rahaxi as an “excellent
partner” and commended it for its commitment to expanding card
acceptance to Chinese visitors in Europe.

He was referring to numerous initiatives launched since 2006 by
Rahaxi in co-operation with CUP to promote the use of CUP credit
and debit cards in Europe.

One of the most significant developments came in July 2008, when
Rahaxi was selected as CUP card processor of choice by Natixis
Paiements, a services partnership between French co-operative
banking groups, Groupe Banque Populaire and Groupe Caisse
d’Epargne.

As part of the agreement Rahaxi is integrating 14,900 merchants
in France for CUP card acceptance. In addition, the two banking
groups, which are currently in the process of merging, operate a
total of some 6,850 branches and 2,000 ATMs in France.

Rahaxi has its origins in Finnish online credit card processing
services provider Rahaxi Processing Oy which was acquired by US
payments processor Freestar Technologies in April 2002 for $4.3
million. In January 2008 Freestar rejected an offer of $45 million
from UK payments processor Planet Payments to acquire Rahaxi.

In the quarter ended 30 September 2008, Freestar reported
revenue of $564,413, up 16 percent compared with the third quarter
of 2007, while transactions processed increased by 2.4 percent to
5.13 million. In November 2008 Freestar was officially renamed
Rahaxi Incorporated.