Global Payments Looks to New Platform for Faster Merchant Integration

Having introduced a new processing platform to ease integration with payment software and hardware products, Global Payments Inc. on Wednesday announced it will work with NitroSell, a supplier of shopping-cart software, to allow NitroSell's merchants to process e-commerce transactions on the new system. Atlanta-based Global Payments last week announced it had brought live Global Transport, a new platform incorporating an application programming interface (API) that should allow the processor to more readily board new merchants. The company is looking to Global Transport, which has been live for two months, to help it penetrate specialized merchant markets, including e-commerce, for processing of credit, debit, and electronic benefits transfer transactions. “The platform gives us the flexibility to develop [new] vertical markets,” says Dean Giancola, vice president of product for Global Payments. As an example, he says, “shopping-cart integration is significantly easier now.” Integration time is now typically three to four weeks, and has been as short as two weeks, with the new system, Giancola says, adding “this is almost unheard-of in the industry.” Before, he says, adding new merchants to the platform usually took three months, with around 45 days in best-case situations. Brian Riley, a senior research analyst at Needham, Mass.-based TowerGroup who follows transaction processors, says the new platform could be a competitive advantage for Global Payments. “They're getting a little ahead” of other processors, he notes. A new front end for the processor's East and Central hosts, Global Transport's API took about six months to build and replaces what Giancola says was “a sort of dated” set of interfaces. “The [new] platform handles files in languages programmers are programming in,” he says, including Java, Web Services, and .Net. Global Payments introduced Global Transport in response to demand from developers who were confronted not only with an integration to Global Payments but with a protocol conversion as well, Giancola says. “The message that came through was, if you could support today's programming languages, that would make our life easier,” he says. Global Transport should also help merchants with unique software needs integrate more readily with the processor. “You're dealing with many native languages,” says analyst Riley. “This gives you one thread.” Giancola points to restaurants, consignment shops, education, and storage businesses as examples of merchant markets with such unique programming. One of the first implementations, though, is with NitroSell, a 3-year-old company with head offices in Cork, Ireland, and Boston whose products work with retail-management software from Microsoft Corp. “The high-speed, secure connection that we have with Global Payments is a significant advantage to our clients,” says Dominic Frazer, sales and marketing director for NitroSell, in a statement. “The new integrated online payment solution means that our customers can now process card payments more quickly and track them online.” Another user is Microhouse Systems Inc., an Ontario-based developer of point-of-sale systems chiefly for fashion and general-merchandise merchants with five to 20 stores. NitroSell has more than 950,000 users of its systems. Microhouse has installations in more than 1,200 locations globally. In its recent quarterly earnings report, Global Payments said its U.S. merchant-services revenue grew 25%, to $165.5 million, in the three months ending Nov. 30 compared to the year-earlier period. Credit and debit card transactions for the period increased 28%. The company, which has been processing for increasing numbers of small merchants signed on by independent sales organizations, needs the new platform to support its growth plans, says Riley. “This fits with a growing business,” he says.