such as a reduced end-of-day. The shifts suggested a good relationship between CSA/Neptune and the banks. Moreover, the Equinox projects at new takers seem to have all gone well. By this time, a two-part change had taken place which ultimately saw the Phoenix system end up back with a US parent, Harland Financial Solutions. First, in May 2004, London Bridge was sold to US credit scoring specialist, Fair Isaac, for £166.2 million. The main interest seemed to be London Bridge’s collections and debt recovery applications and, sure enough, in late 2004, the Phoenix business was offloaded to Harland, with Phoenix added to its existing suite of back office systems and front-end solutions. In fact, a couple of the original senior management team at Phoenix International were now at Harland, most notably Raju Shivdasani (formerly president at Phoenix and now president, core systems group, at Harland). Harland is focused on its domestic US market but the stated aim was that it would continue to pursue international business via distributors. In fact, the US nature of the new owner of Phoenix looked as though it might make life easier for Neptune, as it looked less likely that their spheres of activity would overlap. However, by late 2005, Harland was finalising an agreement by which International Turnkey Systems could sub-license the Phoenix system to third parties. Geographies cited included Africa and, indeed, International Turnkey Systems had a potential distributor lined up in CSA’s home country of Nigeria.


While Harland started to gain wins for Phoenix in the


US, Neptune continued on its way in Africa. In mid-2005, it ticked off another country when Peoples Own Savings Bank of Zimbabwe signed. The evaluation took in the likes of I-flex, Misys, Temenos, Infosys and SAP. It involved external consultants and the decision was vetted by the State Procurement Board. Outlets comprised post offices, sub-post offices, and 28 branches, plus the largest ATM network in the country. It wanted to unify and streamline its processes, centralise its back office, and improve its customer service. Not long after, Neptune gained another deal in Uganda, at Nile Bank. It is a privately held retail bank with shareholders in Uganda, South Africa and Israel. It was set up in 1988, had six branches and 89,000 customers. It signed a broad deal across core retail, treasury, trade finance, reconciliations, internet banking, SMS banking, and CRM. It took the system on Linux. Influences in the selection cited by the bank were functionality, track-record in the country and, more specifically, the track- record of migrating banks from Nile Bank’s existing system. The situation in Nigeria was unexpectedly thrown into


turmoil when, in July 2004, Charles Soludo, governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, ordered banks to increase their minimum shareholder capital from N2 billion ($15 million) to


N25 billion (at the time, only two banks – Union Bank and First Bank of Nigeria – had a capital base exceeding N25 billion). The aim was to cull the 89 mostly weak and under-capitalised banks down to 25 to create leaner, stronger players that could facilitate the country’s economic development. The transformation was achieved in just 18 months. The first resultant win claimed by Neptune was at Platinum Habib Bank, the result of a merger of Platinum Bank, an Equinox user, and Habib Bank, a Bankmaster client. Neptune also racked up a win at the IBTC Chartered Bank Group. This was the result of a merger of the wholesale operation known as Investment Banking and Trust Company, a former Flexcube user, and Chartered Bank and Regent Bank – both Equinox clients.


In late 2005, Neptune gained a first Zambian win. This was at securities broker and dealer, Intermarket Banking Corporation. It signed for core retail and treasury, on a Windows platform. The selection, which took in a wide range of suppliers, was driven by the institution’s intended transformation from a discount house to a fully fledged commercial bank. A swift implementation and broad product support were key criteria. Interestingly, Intermarket had signed a couple of years earlier with Misys for Equation for Zimbabwe, with that deal also intended to incorporate implementation of this system in Zambia. Neptune’s regional director, Chibuzo Ene, said Intermarket Zambia had evaluated Equation and other systems but had decided that Equinox was a better fit for its business profile. The deal was signed in November with cut-over due in February 2006. Despite the similar claim in 2002, in 2005 Neptune claimed


the front-end was now web-enabled within its latest release. The 2005 version was able to support regional, distributed as well as centralised processing, and a combination of these, in view of the target countries’ inherent telecommunication problems. With this in mind, a ‘branch empowerment’ feature was also added to enable a branch to operate off-line for up to 30 days, with synchronisation able to be done at a later date. The end of 2005 also saw a partnership with US-based Openlink for its Findur front-to-back office treasury and capital markets system, along with a tie-up with Business Objects in the area of business intelligence. It had also started reselling an ERP solution which it had sourced from an unnamed third party company. Resold as Nexus ERP, a couple of customers had been gained in Nigeria, outside of banking, by the end of 2005. Neptune sales director, Atul Pande (who had an ERP background), said there were 350+ customers for the system around the globe. For quality assurance, by the end of 2005 Neptune had gained ISO 9001:2000 certification and had embarked on CMM assessment.


Universal Banking Systems Market Report | www.ibsintelligence.com 285


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