BankServ

San Francisco-based BankServ was founded in 1996 as one of the first companies to offer point-of-sale check conversion and ACH item processing for merchants. Today the company is a major wire-transfer processor handling $3 billion per day for more than 100 financial institutions. It also processes 2 million echecks per month, an area that has been growing rapidly, up from just 2 million processed all of last year (2001).

The company offers a variety of payment-related services including interbank transfers, online account opening and funding, business-to-business payments, business-to-consumer payments, Internet checks, ACH funds transfers, online wire transfers, credit card processing, and authentication and security capabilities.

BankServ is owned by several individuals and two venture funds: Preferred Capital Management and Thomson Financial Investors.

CashEdge

Founded in 1999, CashEdge has attracted a number of blue-chip backers and clients. For example, Yahoo has provided CashEdge-powered interbank transfers since early 2001. Investors include CIBC, RBC Financial Group, General Atlantic Partners, and Marsh & McLennan Capital.

CashEdge provides new account funding, interbank funds transfer, and email payments through its Money Movement Suite. And it’s the only epayments vendor with a significant account aggregation presence. Its aggregation platform features alerts, planning and budgeting tools, portfolio analysis, wireless options, and the ability for the end-user’s authorized advisors to view aggregated data.

On Sept. 30, the company is expected to announce an overnight payment option between customers at participating banks. Initially, Digital Insight’s 1,500 clients will be able to offer the service. This appears to be a significant improvement to interbank funds transfer and we’ll look at it closer as more details are released.

CashEdge has 20 clients including Vanguard, Royal Bank, CIBC, TD Canada, Laurentian Bank, Yahoo, Advanced Federal CU and four advisory firms. Along with Digital Insight, the company is working 724 Solutions, Sanchez, and most recently Financial Fusion (July ‘02) and NYCE (Sept. ‘02).