Tag: Payments

A picture of the "chance" square on a Monopoly board, symbolizing the opportunities of re-built payment systems

Why You Should Change Your Legacy Payment System

Christoph Laurer Leave a comment

You have a big problem with your payment system. 

At least that’s why we suppose you read this article. 

Maybe your business just started, but the payment system you integrated already struggles to meet customer expectations. Or you run an established platform, but your legacy system has grown into an inflexible and costly monolith of different providers.

If you work with a particular provider like PayPal or have integrated a variety of individual acquirers or PSPs, you cannot excess full control over your payment. For example, feature updates, security or transaction limits and fees lie outside your agency. 

However, perhaps your transaction system runs just fine, it is functional and flexible. But have you utilized its full potential yet? Have you thought about adding e-money wallet functionalities to enable P2P transactions, loyalty point systems or quick refunds? 

Whatever of the above is the case, this article is for you. It will discuss how you can turn your legacy system into a version that better suits your needs. By finding a proper payment solution provider and adding payment orchestration and e-wallet functionalities, you will be able to take back control. 

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An assemblage of violins, symbolizing payment orchestration

What Is Payment Orchestration (And Why Have It)?

Christoph Laurer Leave a comment

Payment Orchestration describes the process of integrating and handling different payment service providers, acquirers and banks on a single, unified software layer. The Payment Orchestration software executes the complete payment processing, from validation to routing to settlement. 

The Payment Orchestration Layer / POL (or Payment Orchestration Platform / POP, respectively) bundles user and merchant accounts, acquirers, payment providers, fraud detection services, etc. to initiate, validate, route and process transactions involving those parties. In addition, it handles payment processes such as reconciliation, billing and settlement, payouts and reporting. 

Thus, a Payment Orchestration Layer acts as the entry point and core of a payment system. This approach differs tremendously from separately integrated PSPs. E-commerce platforms and online service providers don’t need to integrate every PSP and every acquirer separately. Instead, they can consume the unified API of the payment orchestration layer, benefiting from a reduced integration complexity. Moreover, a POL simplifies the maintenance and further development of the system for platform owners and for merchants. In the same vein, it eases the interaction with 3rd party service providers.

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A car computer of a modern car, presenting digital content and e-commerce options

Automotive Payment Solutions – Fast Lane to Car Maker Success

Christoph Laurer Leave a comment

The future of automotive will not be about how fast your car can go. Or how snappy it can look. Instead, innovation will centre around what a car can do. As a manufacturer, you already witness the shift towards connected vehicles with high-end telematics and web-enabled computers under the hood. Those cars can communicate with external e-commerce applications and service platforms.

And that comes with technical challenges. One of the most pressing for car manufacturers: Providing a solid automotive payment system to handle all in-car commercial activities. 

One may be tempted to turn to the obvious choice: Turn-key payment software by 3rd parties. But once you scale up, the drawbacks surrounding such off-the-shelf solutions begin to show.

The alternative would be to choose the payment orchestration model and build up your very own connected car payment infrastructure. You can bring in a business and/or a software partner with experience in the automotive payment domain to support you there.

This article will help you answer, whether this approach fits your business. It discusses: 

  • Which use cases require connected car payments?
  • What are the advantages of custom-built automotive payment solutions over standard 3rd-party payment systems?
  • How will you benefit from payment orchestration? 
  • Where to find competent technology partners to support you?

Let’s go for the answers! 

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A robot hand holding a vintage ladies' wallet, representing electronic wallets or e-wallets, respectively

What Is An E-Wallet – Definitions and Technical Distinctions

Christoph Laurer Leave a comment

E-wallets are software programs which securely store data. This data is needed to enable the wallet owner to conduct payments online or at points-of-sale. And they do so by use of a specific device.  

That’s as close to an encompassing definition of e-wallets, or electronic wallets respectively, as we will probably get. But it’s also just the surface of what electronic wallets – sometimes also called digital wallets or (obsoletely) cyberwallets – can do. Over the last decade, e-wallet technology has found application to a variety of use cases. This article will cast a light on the term E-wallet, especially in the context of online payments. In the following paragraphs you’ll find: 

  • Definitions of certain types of e-wallets 
  • An overview of their common functionalities 
  • A breakdown of e-wallet-based payment 
  • An outlook on their role in the future of payments and e-commerce
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Bogdan Dinu, Head of Product at Thunes and interview partner in this cross-border payments talk.

Finquiry #2: Bogdan Dinu on Cross-Border Payments

Christoph Laurer Leave a comment

Since the dawn of the Internet age, global economies have grown closer – as did the underlying financial systems. Today, we can digitally purchase a product with materials from Eastern Europe, produced in Singapore, refined and branded for sale in Canada, and eventually shipped to Brazil. All countries involved in this supply chain have to maintain financial relationships and this also necessitates numerous cross-border payments.

However, that’s easier said than done. Complying to all regulations, security processes and technical requirements necessary to move funds from one country to the other comes with high efforts and costs for service providers.

For our fintech interview series “Finquiry”, we have asked cross-border payments expert Bogdan Dinu to break down what goes behind facilitating effective and low-cost transfers.

Our Guest: Bogdan Dinu, Head of Product at Thunes

Our interview partner Bogdan Dinu is the perfect expert to lead us through the dense jungle of the cross-border payments landscape. As the Head of Product in leading global payments network Thunes, he is set to support the business through its next phase of global expansion. 

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Two businessmen lining out a payment gateway for their online marketplace and other platforms of the platform economy.

Empowering the Platform Economy

Christoph Laurer Leave a comment
aye4fin Managing Partner Thomas Tittelbach, presenting 5 important topics when creating payment gateways on a business level.
Thomas Tittelbach, Managing Partner at aye4fin gives you a detailed overview of how to approach building a payment gateway from a business perspective.

E-commerce is a growing market – but it’s not taking place entirely within single online shops. By far not. Online marketplace environments have cemented their presence all over the web, be they specialized in dealing with certain types of goods or all-in-one digital warehouses. In addition to retail, service platforms and even comparison portals have found their niches as well. In short: We live in the age of the platform economy – driven by smooth-flowing online payment solutions.

Yet sometimes the last part is more wishful thinking than reality. Payment processing requires a payment gateway designed for the specific transaction flows, which occur in marketplaces. And if you want to design such a well-functioning solution yourself, you can turn it into a business case on its own.

Of course, there are things to keep in mind, from a business perspective. In this second part of our Article Series on Payment Gateway Building, we give you an overview of those. Here are five topics to consider when building payment gateways for marketplace platforms.

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A world map with a paper ship, symbolizing the world of payment.

Payment Around the World – Part 3

Christoph Laurer Leave a comment

Asia, India, the Middle East

Payment around the world – where were we? In the previous articles of this series, we devoted ourselves to different payment landscapes of the globe. And with the trends and challenges, we found there.

But no matter which region we looked at: All of them stood on the verge of digital transformation or have crossed that line. China and the USA press ahead in terms of payment innovation, as we have seen in our second article. In other countries, digital payments are still in the process of taking hold in the populace. The changes they bring have already become apparent. Digital payment services play the role of an equalizer, especially for the unbanked people. Developments in Africa‘s and Latin America’s payment landscape, as detailed in the first article of this series, stand as an example for this.

We will see if those tendencies manifest in the last waypoints of our journey, too. So, let’s move on, shall we?  

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A compass resting on a world map, symbolizing the world of payment

Payment Around the World – Part 2

Christoph Laurer Leave a comment

USA, Canada, Australia, China

When exploring the payment preferences of the world, you have to go places. In the first part of our article series, those places were Europe, Russia, Latin America, and Africa.

The takeaway: Hard cash dies hard in many parts of the world like Germany, Hungary, Russia, and Brazil. But digital payment services have taken up the fight. They give new options to emerging countries with vast numbers of unbanked people. Mobile access to finances and digital-only money accounts help integrate the unbanked, so they can become proactive contributors to the financial system.

But it’s a large world with a great number of payment landscapes still waiting to be sketched. In this article, we will take a good look at the clashing fintech forerunners USA and China, as well as Canada and Oceania. So, let’s go!

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A stylized smartphone showing an different emoney business options, from governmental to payment applications

Building Your Own Emoney Online Business

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Prospects and Challenges

In the modern economy, digital payment processes have become a key business factor. Electronic money is transferred across virtual wallets all over the globe at second intervals — or even quicker. Who can build and innovative emoney business quickly, can carve out a niche for themselves.

“Fast-pacedness, however, is not the only reason behind the rise of ewallets and payment software. Profitability also plays a huge role. According to statistics by McKinsey, shifting their customers from traditional offline to digital accounts can save an enterprise up to 90 percent in service costs. Consequently, mobile and online payment solutions are in high demand. In 2016 the Statista Digital Market Outlook predicted an increasing growth rate for the mobile payment sector. 63% within 5 years, to be exact.

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