News Briefs

Russian search engine provider Yandex has launched a service that
enables its Yandex.Money online payments service customers to
transfer funds to and from their online accounts via ATMs. The
Russian Development Bank is the first bank to offer the service and
other banks are anticipated to follow soon, according to
Yandex.

 
MERGERS AND ACQUISITIONS

In a deal worth SEK157 million ($26 million) French smartcard
developer Oberthur Technologies has acquired Swedish rival XPonCard
Group, a move that creates the second largest player in the global
smartcard industry. According to Oberthur the acquisition will
provide “the cornerstone” for its presence in Scandinavia, Finland,
the Baltics and Poland, the markets in which XPonCard is the
dominant player: Pro forma sales of the merged group are €878
million ($1.35 billion) of which XPonCard will contribute €120
million.

 
BILL PAYMENTS

Not only do US consumers paying monthly bills online save $100 on
postage and $50 annually (based on 20 bills per month) they also
save a considerable amount of time, according to payment industry
body the National Automated Clearing House Association. Online bill
pay specialist CheckFree estimates that paying bills by cheque is a
two hour a month task compared with 15 minutes via the internet, a
time saving of an entire day each year

 
BIOMETRICS

Sixty percent of consumers in eight countries surveyed by market
research firm TNS believe that by 2015 paying by fingerprint
technology will be readily available. Though on average 41 percent
of respondents feel the concept has high appeal, this reaction
ranged from 24 percent in Germany to 60 percent in China.

 
ATM

In an initiative to replace all ATM’s over 10-years-old state-owned
Brazilian bank Caixa Economica Federal has placed an order with US
ATM manufacturer Diebold for the supply of 9,600 new machines. The
order represents one of the biggest single ATM orders in
history.