As banks look towards their priorities for the coming year, instant payments – particularly the new European Instant Payments Regulation (IPR) – loom large in the minds of many. A poll of…

Instant payments, characterised by their speed and availability, are transforming the financial landscape across the globe. The Asia-Pacific (APAC) region in particular, has emerged as a leader in adopting and innovating in…

Icon recently released IPF 2024.1, which included upgrading all of our components to Java 17 and required Java 17 as a minimum. I was the lead engineer on this piece of work,…

Matt Piper, Head of Pre-Sales at Icon Solutions, explains why flexibility is key when it comes to future-proofing payments but, to understand the steps that must be taken, there are fundamental questions…

Following NACHA’s annual Smart Faster Payments Conference in Miami, Arjeh van Oijen, Head of Product Management for Icon Solutions, explores the key trends shaping the rollout and adoption of real-time payments in…

In the run up to NACHA’s annual Smart Faster Payments Conference in Miami, Arjeh van Oijen, Head of Product Management for Icon Solutions, explains why real-time payments are top of the agenda…

In this blog, Jamie Packham, shares his own experiences deploying generative artificial intelligence (AI) models and explores the potential for AI to help accelerate banks’ migration to the ISO 20022 messaging standard….

It is critical for financial institutions to have an efficient Reconciliation and Investigation (R&I) capability to minimise financial risk by identifying potential payment errors, discrepancies, or irregularities promptly and fixing them early…

A recent independent survey conducted by Celent found that 73% of corporate banks have reported clear revenue benefits from investment in advanced data analytics. Looking ahead, analytics, intelligent automation, and artificial intelligence…

Back before Christmas, at the same time as the Chancellor’s Autumn Statement, a new report by HM Treasury was released – the Future of Payments Review report [1]. This report proposes a set…

In the first blog of our two-part predictions series, we explored the key technological and regulatory trends shaping the payments landscape in 2024. In this second blog, we explore the practical strategies…

2023 put the traditional processing model for account-based payments to the test, as evolving customer demands, intensifying competition from fintechs and shifting regulatory requirements continued to intensify margin pressures. And although 2024…

Last month Icon hosted its final IPF Client Day of 2023. The event brought our clients together in London to explore the latest business trends in the payments market and technologies shaping…

Where is your bank on the order management (or pre-processing, or initiation management – whichever you prefer) maturity scale? Are you running your order management on legacy technology as a routing/integration layer…

With Artificial Intelligence (AI) being part of the Zeitgeist and almost every newspaper containing an article on AI, it is reasonable to want to ensure that your business can gain competitive advantage…

This Tier 1 bank was looking for a payments infrastructure that would allow them greater flexibility, speed and innovation. The bank recognised Icon’s proven track record in delivering payments transformation strategies for…

Icon Solutions was founded in 2009 with the desire to be different and simplify banking transformation, using technological expertise and deep experience to fight complexity, promote transparency and put the needs of…

With the Payments IT landscape frequently changing due to regulations, customer needs, and innovations, Financial Institutions (FIs) face challenges of high cost, slow pace of change, operational complexities, and a constant struggle…

By all measures, Sibos 2023 in Toronto was a great success. The event brought together more than 9,000 attendees to discuss this edition’s theme – ‘Collaborative finance in a fragmented world’. Rich…

Traditional banking has evolved over centuries into what we have today: digitalized products and services that keep the worldwide economic cogs turning. In pursuit of automation and digitalization banks have accrued sizeable…

As banks continue to grapple with the account-based payments processing model amid seemingly interminable margin pressures, the wider commercial implications of software developer capacity limitations are coming into much sharper focus. In…

The traditional payments processing model for account-based payments is under unprecedented strain amid diminishing profit margins, increasing competition from fintechs, and rising costs. These challenges are only set to compound in a…

The rapid convergence of emerging technologies and evolving business models is presenting banks with systemic and operational challenges that are proving profoundly difficult to navigate. Many banks are simply slow in responding…

On 28th June 2023, the European Commission (EC) set out its proposals for ‘modernising payment services and opening financial services data’. The proposals for payments – referred to as ‘PSD3’ –essentially reflect…

At a recent payments forum hosted by the Bank of Finland, ECB board member Fabio Panetta signalled commercial banks must make instant payments ‘cheap and easy to use’. While on the operational…

How many people have heard of Kathleen Booth or Margaret Hamilton? Chances are not many. But why not? These two women achieved two significant firsts. Kathleen invented the first assembly language and Margaret,…

In the fourth part of our series exploring the motivations, architecture and principles driving the development of IPF, Tom Beadman, Principal Engineer at Icon Solutions, discusses the benefits of using Domain-Specific Languages…

As competition in payments has increased, data has long been touted as the cure-all for incumbent banks. If banks could charge a transaction fee for every time they are told that ‘data…

Remaining competitive in payments is the key to future relevance and profitability for incumbent banks. But with incumbents now competing on multiple fronts against various players, how can they stay ahead of…

13 April 2021 – Icon Solutions, the specialist provider of world-class payment solutions and technology consultancy services for banks and other financial services organisations, has today announced the appointment of Simon Barrows…

For several decades, incumbent banks have held a comfortable leadership position in payments. But the rapid growth of digital payments has signalled opportunity for new market entrants to attack this status quo….

In July 2020, a group of sixteen major European banks from five Euro countries announced the launch of the European Payments Initiative (EPI) with the aim of creating a unified payment solution…

For decades, incumbent banks have held a leadership position in the payments business and enjoyed high fees, healthy margins and limited competition. But as the payments ecosystem expands, these incumbents find themselves competing…

Setting the scene In the third part of our series exploring the motivations, architecture and principles driving the development of IPF, Pat Altaie, Senior Consultant, discusses the benefits of using interoperable programming…

11th January 2021 –  Icon Solutions, the specialist provider of world-class payment solutions and consultancy services, has today announced the appointment of Alastair Brown to its Board of Directors. Alastair is the…

It has been said that prediction is very difficult, especially if it’s about the future. The unprecedented events of 2020 demonstrated quite how difficult it can be. The monumental uplifts in digital…

In the second part of our series exploring the motivations, architecture and principles driving the development of IPF, Sirin Sevinc, Senior Solution Architect, explains the roles CQRS and Event Sourcing play in…

24th November 2020 – Icon Solutions, the leading provider of technology solutions and real-time payments expertise, has been featured in Financial IT’s winter magazine ‘Innovations in FinTech‘ (page 28). Financial IT interviewed…

Standardisation, regulation and technological innovation means payments are well on the way to becoming instant, invisible and free. This is good news for everybody. Well, not quite everybody. Banks are now faced…

Over the past 20+ years, I have been deeply involved in designing, building and delivering systems in a few different sectors across a multitude of technologies and methodologies, varying team sizes and…

29th October 2020 –  Icon Solutions, the specialist provider of world-class payment solutions and consultancy services, today announced a strategic investment from J.P. Morgan. Icon Solutions is a leading global provider of…

As part of Icon Solutions’ thought leadership in the world of payments, our latest webinar, ‘Busting the Myths of Payments Transformation’, delved into the noise and misnomers in the payments transformation space and…

Icon Solutions has been shortlisted in the ‘Payment Technology Provider of the Year’ category at this year’s Payments Awards. Organised by FStech and Retail Systems the Payments Awards “recognise and celebrate companies…

03 September 2020 – Icon Solutions, the specialist provider of payment solutions and consultancy services, has been selected by a Tier One Australian Bank to review and industrialise its payments transformation strategy….

What’s next for banks in this strange new world we find ourselves in? Forget the forecasts and predictions, we are in uncharted territory and the honest answer is that no one truly…

‘Payments transformation’ has emerged as perhaps the single biggest opportunity for banks. But getting payments transformation right is no easy task. With only 9% of banks nearing completion in their transformation efforts,…

Payments transformation has emerged as perhaps both the single biggest opportunity, and challenge, for banks. Given the proven link between successful payments transformation and payments profitability the potential rewards are huge. But…

In the U.S. and across the globe, financial institutions are wrestling with evolving consumer expectations, razor-thin margins and increased competition. Yet, significant opportunities are there for those who have built a foundation…

The new report “The Payments Transformation Race: Criteria for Success” from Aite and Icon Solutions identified that banks that have a clear and robust payments transformation plan are more profitable than their…

London, 4th October 2019 – Icon Solutions, the leading provider of technology solutions and payments expertise, is delighted to announce it will be exhibiting at this year’s AFP 2019 Show in Boston 20-23rd…

Icon Solutions, a leading Fintech provider of payment and technology solutions, was approached by City AM to give a view on whether we should be worried about yesterday’s services sector PMI data. Simon…

Icon Solutions, a leading Fintech provider of payment and technology solutions, has commissioned Aite, an independent research and advisory firm, to explore the payments transformation progress of global banks. The research provides…

Faster Payments have changed the world for the better and many corporates are already reaping the benefits. During our recent webinar we heard from industry experts in the US, Steve Ledford –…

Icon Solutions, a leading Fintech provider of payment and technology solutions, has commissioned Aite, an independent research and advisory firm, to explore the payments transformation progress of global banks. ‘Payment transformation’ is…

While payments transformation is high on the list of priorities for banks, there is a lack of information around strategic considerations, best practice and how to minimise risk to ensure success. In…

While Canada has been a leader in mobile and app-based banking technology, the same cannot be said for the speed of their implementation of Real Time Payments (RTP).  However, the last Payments…

Icon Solutions, a leading Fintech provider of payment and technology solutions, is delighted to announce that Gema Montoya, Head of Continental Europe, will speak at NACHA’s Alliance 2019 Spring Meeting in Madrid…

Thank you to all who completed our recent survey, developed in partnership with InstaPay.  As you’ll remember, the aim of the survey was to understand how far along banks are from adopting…

As part of a NACHA initiative, we are conducting a short survey to collect views from the banking community on the adoption of real-time payments and payments modernisation in North America. The results…

Discover the era of collaborative payments platform at NACHA Payments 2019! For the last 10 years banks have focused on consolidating payment infrastructures, but have ended up with multiple ‘hubs’, inefficient processes,…

London, 3rd April 2019 – Icon Solutions, the leading provider of technology solutions and real-time payments expertise, is delighted to announce it will be sponsoring The Payments Canada Summit in Toronto this year,…

Since Fed catalysed the private sector to deliver real-time payment capabilities, there has been advocacy for the central bank backed, real-time payments (RTP) scheme. Many feel the lack of a ubiquitous RTP…

Last week I attended a Women in Payments event entitled, ‘New Payments Architecture – What can we expect and how will we get there?’ The event was hosted by AmazonPay in London…

  This week Icon Solutions had the pleasure of hosting a discussion around the UK’s New Payments Architecture, focusing on the Request to Pay (RtP) service which is due to be launched…

  London, 22nd November 2018 – Icon Solutions, a leading provider of Payment Solutions, is now ready to help payment service providers connect to the European Central Bank’s Target Instant Payments Settlement (TIPS) service…

Germany is undergoing something of a fintech renaissance with startups like challenger bank Number 26 taking advantage of the culture of innovation fostered in cities like Berlin. This spirit of innovation is…

  At Icon we firmly believe that the combination of APIs and Instant Payments will provide a powerful alternative to card payments, particularly in e-and m-commerce. And it’s not just our belief…

Having just attended the Pay.UK (formerly known as New Payment System Operator (NPSO)) progress update event, there seems to be a good amount of excitement, anticipation and intrigue around the launch of the New…

There is a lively debate on whether the modern real-time payment infrastructures came into being through regulation or out of commercial necessity and end-user demand. Although regulators are almost always involved in…

  IPF, Icon Solutions’ ground-breaking solution for accelerating the transition to instant payments, has been shortlisted for ‘Payments Innovation of the Year’ at this year’s Payments Awards. The Payments Awards recognise cards…

As the third and final part of this video series on real-time payment challenges, Simon Wilson, Icon’s Global Software Sales Director talks about why real-time payments are increasingly essential. He also touches…

Icon’s Global Software Sales Director, Simon Wilson, addresses one of the biggest questions asked when moving into real-time payments, “How do I find the right payment solution and partner to suit my…

  I recently had the pleasure of speaking at an event in Paris organised in partnership with DXC, one of Icon’s partner organisations. The audience included representatives of banks and corporates, and…

Simon Wilson, Global Software Sales Director at Icon Solutions provides insights on the three areas that every organisation should consider when implementing their real-time payments solution.  

There was one overwhelming take away for me from EBAday in Munich. It was that the phrase “instant payments is the new normal” has become meaningless. The statement fails to capture the…

I was recently preparing a presentation for an Instant Payments client of ours, and one of the boilerplate slides that I’ve been using for years shows “Instant Payments Around the Globe”. It…

The convergence of Open Banking, PSD2 and instant payments are giving rise to new use cases in the payments industry on an almost daily basis. The creation of new customer centric value-added…

  Welcome back! The past two posts in our series on building reactive systems have dealt with the topics of performance and fault-tolerance. In this post I’m going to talk about resilience,…

  En France, de nombreuses banques étudient actuellement l’évolution des systèmes de paiement en vue d’adopter les Instant Payments. Ceci est principalement dû à des facteurs tels que la réduction des coûts,…

  A few years ago, the question “how fast is fast” was being debated across the globe, with many organizations feeling that faster was good enough and hoping to get away with…

  You would think from the many articles, discussion panels and chaotic clamour regarding ISO 20022 in recent years, that it was the new kid on the block. However, ISO 20022 has been slowly…

  “Been there, done that, got the scars to prove it!” Experience is a great thing, but it’s sometimes painful to get it the hard way. It’s quicker, less expensive, and generally…

  The recent InstaPay webinar “Transitioning to Instant Payments in Germany” provided some more TIPS (pun intended) for the introduction of SCT Inst.  Icon’s very own Gene Neyer took part along with…

  In the previous post in this series, we talked about the performance and scalability benefits that we get from actors and the actor system. I also briefly mentioned fault tolerance and…

How can Banks in Germany prepare for Instant Payments whilst controlling costs and managing risks? And what can we learn from those who have already travelled the path to Instant Payments? In…

  London, 12th March 2018 – Icon Solutions, the leading provider of technology solutions and real time payments expertise, are delighted to return as an exhibitor at NACHA’s prestigious Faster Payments 2018…

  London, 9th March 2018 – Icon Solutions, the leading provider of technology solutions and real-time payments expertise, today announced the appointment of Toine van Beusekom as Head of Payments Architecture. With…

  While the conversations we have had with payments business leaders point to a willingness to participate in the Clearing House’s RTP scheme, many of them are struggling with the business case…

  In a recent interview with PYMNTS, Darren Capehorn, Icon’s Director of Services, and Gene Neyer, Executive Advisor, discuss how payments are changing and how flexible technology can help banks adapt to…

  As part of Icon’s continued efforts to support the adoption of Instant Payments across the Eurozone, we were invited to present our thoughts and expertise on Instant Payments to a wide…

  London, 10th January 2018 – Icon Solutions, the leading provider of technology solutions and real-time payments expertise, today announced the appointment of industry luminary Gene Neyer as Executive Advisor to the…

  Much of what we write about on the Icon blog is instant payments and instant payment adoption around the world. This blog is part of a series, which aims to bring…

  In the Canadian market, both consumers and banks have been early adopters when it comes to banking innovation, whether it is mobile, desktop or behind the scenes technology. Canadian consumers generally expect,…

  The Clearing House’s (TCH) central processing scheme in the US has recently started Real Time Payments (RTP) testing for the clearance and settlement of funds between banks. The event is significant…

  Ovum Report: Real-Time Payments Key Driver for $3.3 Billion Rise in Technology Spend by North American Commercial Banks 50 percent of U.S. and 40 percent of Canadian banks to increase investment…

  The latest stats from the European Payments Council (EPC), show there are over 400 German Payment Service Providers (PSPs) gearing up to go-live early next year with EBA Clearing’s new SCT…

  This week the Icon team was at Money 20/20 where we saw a lot of discussion around the new ways in which consumers are interacting with their money, modes of payments…

  At the recent Sibos 2017 conference in Toronto, one theme rang out loud and clear – it’s time to think about the corporate. The common thread throughout the four-day conference was…

  London, 12th October 2017 –Icon Solutions, the leading provider of technology solutions and real time payments expertise, are looking forward to attending the highly regarded Money20/20 in Las Vegas, which will…

  London, 10th October 2017 –Icon Solutions, the leading provider of technology solutions and real time payments expertise, are delighted to announce their participation at Sibos, SWIFT’s annual global event for the…

After commissioning a ground-breaking whitepaper from Ovum, the market-leading research and consulting firm, Icon Solutions has now produced an infographic visually illustrating the results of the research. The research “Instant payments and…

  London, 5th October 2017 – Icon Solutions are delighted to announce the appointment of Tom Hay, Head of Payments, to the European Payments Council’s Scheme Technical Forum (ESTF). The Forum is…

London, 19th September 2017 – Icon Solutions, a leading provider of technology solutions and instant payments consultancy, has successfully completed EBA Clearing’s testing procedure for SCT Inst payments – proving full compliance with the…

  London, 5 September 2017, Icon Solutions, the independent IT payment specialist technology provider and consultancy, has today announced the appointment of a strategic senior hire in Canada. Jason Hayes, has joined Icon…

London, 4th August 2017 – Icon Solutions, a leading provider of technology solutions and instant payments consultancy, today announces the start of functional testing between the Instant Payments Framework (IPF) and RT1,…

Icon’s Director of Services, Darren Capehorn is scheduled to speak at Payments International on Thursday 14th September 2017. Darren will be presenting ‘Instant Payments – it’s not all about speed…or consumers’ and…

  London, 27th July 2017 – Icon Solutions, a leading provider of technology solutions and real-time payments consultancy, today announces the completion of connectivity testing between its Instant Payments Framework (IPF) and…

  London, July 13th 2017 – Icon Solutions, an independent award-winning payment and specialist technology company, has donated £62k during the last 12 months in charitable programmes around the world supporting health,…

  In 2014 Europe started ramping up the rhetoric for building a pan European Instant Payments solution (now known as SCT-Inst). In response, various forums sprung up to enable interested parties to…

  It’s fair to say that Dublin in the June sunshine was out to impress the financial world attending the European Banking Association’s 12th annual congress. Dublin, founded by the Vikings during…

London, EBAday 2017,  Finextra     Finextra interviews Icon’s Richard Dear on the Ovum research “Instant Payments and the Post-PSD2 Landscape” as well as the challenges banks are facing when planning and implementing…

London, EBAday 2017,  Finextra     Finextra  interviews Icon’s Richard Dear regarding financial organisations seeking to move to instant payments. In this interview, Richard identifies some of the key challenges involved and…

While the industry continues its race against time to be PSD2-ready in January 2018, there still remains a number of unknowns and conflicting opinions on how the banking and payments landscape will…

Dublin, June 21st 2017 – Icon Solutions has completed connectivity testing between IPF and SIA’s high-speed and secure network infrastructure SIAnet, which provides access to EBA Clearing’s platform for instant payments. SIAnet…

  Retail Instant Payments in Europe will hit €725bn in transactions by the end of 2027 Single card payments set to decline from 40% to 11% market share by 2027 Instant Payments…

London, 14 June, 2017 – Form3, the cloud based end-to-end secure standard for global payments processing, today announced a partnership with Icon Solutions, a payment and specialist technology provider. The deal extends…

  London, June 13th 2017, Icon Solutions, a leading provider of technology and instant payments solutions, has today announced its expansion into the Hungarian market by partnering with T-Systems Hungary to provide customers with…

  With PSD2 around the corner and Instant Payments no longer a dot on the horizon, the crucial question is: are you ready? Icon Solutions will be partnering with Capgemini to host…

  Icon Solutions, a leading provider of technology solutions and real-time payments consultancy has just announced the enhancement of its Instant Payments Framework (IPF) product to support connectivity to The Clearing House’s…

  PSD2 brings a seismic shift in what it fundamentally means to be a bank. It’s no longer enough to be a trusted custodian of consumer transactions and the traditional bank position…

  London, 23 May 2017, Icon Solutions, the independent IT payment specialist technology provider and consultancy, has today announced the appointment of a strategic senior hire in the US.  James Methe, previously Capgemini’s Senior Director,…

  With real-time payments on the horizon for the US, NACHA’s Faster Payments 2017  was a key conference for payments professionals. But how close is real-time payments to becoming the norm there…

  Icon Solutions is delighted to be participating in the InstaPay webinar: Is Europe ready for SCT Inst? How ready are organisations for SCT Inst? Webinar: Wednesday 3rd May 2017 12pm BST/…

  What insights can the U.S. take from early real-time payments adopters?    Change is constant in the banking and payments industry – and organizations that can keep pace with this change…

  Real time means ‘now’, like boom – you have it, just like receiving a WhatsApp message. And if we think of what ‘now’ means for e-commerce, the first things that come…

London, 13 April 2017,  Ovum releases: On the Radar – Icon Solutions adds real-time capability to existing systems, which evaluates Icon’s Instant Payments Framework (IPF).This is the latest release in their series…

London, 12 April 2017,  Richard Dear is interviewed by Julie Muhn at Finovate on Icon’s Instant Payments Framework (IPF) that will help keep banks PSD2 compliant. IT payment consultancy Icon Solutions is tackling…

  Icon Solutions is delighted to be an exhibitor at NACHA’s prestigious Faster Payments 2017 event in Austin, Texas. Taking place in April, Faster Payments 2017 brings together those who are driving and…

London, 6 March 2017,  Fintech Finance      Fintech Finance interview Richard Dear and Tom Hay at Finovate 2017,  on Icon’s Instant Payments Framework (IPF), a real-time payments orchestration engine, built from the ground…

  Following the success of our whitepaper PSD2 Draft RTS: Ten Key Points, we will be holding an exclusive webinar on the key insights from the recently published PSD2 RTS. Final PSD2 RTS…

  At Finovate Europe, 2017, 71 Fintech companies got to present their latest and greatest products via a 7 minute live demo, in front of 1,500 people.  What makes this years’ Finovate…

The end of 2016 witnessed an excellent step by the Hungarian Central Bank (MNB) – the release of the ‘Operational model of the instant payment service in Hungary’. It is remarkable for…

  A recent survey conducted by InstaPay.today highlighted that key stakeholders within the instant payments industry overwhelmingly believe that it is consumer demand driving instant payments, and not new regulations. The survey was…

  SEPA instant payments (SCT inst) is the first instant payment scheme to be inter-operable in a region as large as SEPA and is a response to European customer needs for faster…