BPCE and BNP Paribas Team Up to Jointly Acquire Payments Processing Technology

BNP Paribas and BPCE announced last week that they will join forces in a strategic partnership project to acquire payment processing technology. The acquisition and implementation of the new tech will benefit both the merchants and cardholders.

Creating A Common Processor To Handle Over 17 Billion Transactions

The two banking groups have decided to jointly address the unprecedented development of payment infrastructures and its future prospects. By acquiring the joint technology, the two would be able to create a common processor that would have the ability to handle all card payments coming from both institutions.

https://x.com/Reuters/status/180137423971232600

Together, the two organizations process over 17 billion transactions, so having a processor that both can use to handle that many transactions would make it the number one processor in France. Not only that, but it would easily rank among the top three in the entire Europe.

Furthermore, the processor would also be able to address some of the leading market challenges. Issues like the acceleration of mobile payments, demand for immediacy, expansion of the e-commerce sector, and innovations enabled by international and domestic schemes alike would all be addressed.

The two banks have already signed an exclusive agreement to create this business model as a joint venture. Their partnership will also respond to the digitization of payment systems, as well as the virtualization of debit cards and the promotion of instantaneous transactions, based on their press release.

The Banks Have An Ambitious Plan

Commenting on the decision to join forces to acquire payments processing technology, BNP Paribas’ CEO and director Jean-Laurent Bonnafe said that the payment systems are essential to the bank’s relationship with its customers. This is why the banking group must ensure they adhere to the highest possible standards.

However, with the increase in card transactions being quite exponential, the banks’ ambition is to create a device that would be both efficient and scalable across all of their locations in Europe. The new payment processor could fulfill that role.

Meanwhile, BPCE’s CEO, Nicolas Namias, commented that the first generation of the collaboration in payments with BNP Paribas was a great success. With that said, the banking group feels confident about entering into this new partnership.

Furthermore, he said that the new collaboration and the new industrial partnership project are in line with the bank’s own strategic plan. In other words, teaming up for this project represents taking an important step toward accelerating innovation in payments in years to come.