How eftpos is supporting Australia’s FinTechs
By Stephen Benton, CEO, eftpos Australia
The way Australians use payments is changing rapidly, driven by a combination of digital technologies, a growing number of nimble new FinTech players, and changes in consumer and merchant payment preferences accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic.
As Australia emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic and the nation’s appetite for the digital economy increases, eftpos can help the Australian FinTech sector thrive and grow by providing low-cost access to our national network and real time processing infrastructure.
Getting the engagement, investment, and regulatory architecture right for the FinTech industry will set Australia up for success in the digital economy for the short-term and in years to come.
For that reason, we recently formed a FinTech Advisory Committee, as another way of giving FinTechs a direct say in how they can access the eftpos national payments network in the future.
This network provides our members and Australian FinTechs the opportunity to build innovative solutions and payments capability, with access to hundreds of thousands of Australian merchants and tens of millions of eftpos-enabled cards.
Ten leading FinTech companies have joined the new committee, which recently began its work via a series of workshops to explore ways to streamline access to the eftpos network. These companies include Assembly Payments, Azupay, Bleuco, Meeco, Monoova, Paypa Plane, Sniip and Verrency, and recommendations will be proposed by mid-2021.
We already know that low-cost access, combined with our mobile payments capability, our ability to issue tokens, and the work we are doing with industry around real time digital payments and a ubiquitous Digital Identity solution, have the potential to bring many FinTech solutions to life. These rich network features could give FinTechs the ability to access, innovate and collaborate in a range of new data sets and marketplaces that currently have high barriers to entry.
We are also collaborating closely with over a dozen organisations including Stone&Chalk and The RegTech Association in an effort to work with the brightest and most innovative Australian minds from the FinTech industry.
In support of this approach, we are actively contributing to various Government endeavours, to assist Australia to become a leading digital economy by 2030 by promoting productivity gains through the uptake of digital technologies.
Cards, and debit cards in particular, are not only by far the most frequently used means of transacting in the economy. They are also the primary source of payments competition in Australia, due to the existence of multiple platforms which drive digital innovation and price-based competition.
Furthermore, we support FinTech industry recommendations that promote Australian businesses, including a ‘buy local’ focus which calls for greater focus and opportunity for local ITC solutions and an increase in local companies’ participation in public procurement.
The eftpos public API Gateway, launched with Australian FinTech partner Verrency, is another example of eftpos’ deepening engagement with the FinTech community. It kicked off a strong development pipeline of multiple API solutions designed to deliver enhanced customer digital payment experiences to benefit consumers and merchants.
We have also joined the Hedera Governing Council which includes a group of highly diversified enterprises and organisations. This comes as we expand upon our existing joint micropayments proof-of-concept, aiming to create a seamless Australian payment experience to enable low-cost micropayments for a range of use cases such as the Internet of Things (IOT) and access to content streamed over the internet. Demonstrating our commitment to this initiative, we will actually run the Australian Hedera network node, alongside some of the world’s largest and most influential companies.
As we continue to engage with the FinTech industry we’re mindful to keep a number of key issues top of mind, including:
- our role as the provider of national, real time processing infrastructure supporting the use of digital technology, empowering and protecting consumers as they transact; and
- online safety and security for industry and consumers, particularly as we roll out our digital strategy and safely expand our digital transactions capabilities.
The growing list of eftpos FinTech partnerships, committees and engagement opportunities provides an ideal environment to share ideas and workshop solutions that have the potential to change the way Australians pay for the better.
