Press release

July 25, 2005

Banking Production Centre (BPC), a leading electronic payments and retail banking solutions provider and systems integrator, announced the signing of a collaboration arrangement with NCT, a provider of card based loyalty solutions.

Under the terms of the agreement, BPC will extend the functionality of its SmartVista processing system by adding the support for NCT’s loyalty bonus schemes. Together the two companies will be able to offer a cutting-edge solution that will help retailers launch multi-merchant loyalty marketing programs based on payment cards.

Today a card combining payment and loyalty functions is the most convenient and efficient vehicle for implementing coalition loyalty programs. Its essential advantage is that the card issuer delivers clear and accurate accounting of bonus points accrued by the customer in retail chains involved in a loyalty program.

NCT’s loyalty solutions provide converting of bonus points into funds later being transferred to a special card account. SmartVista supports several accounts linked to one card and thus allows creating a separate account for “bonus funds” where bonus points are accumulated.

The identification of customers in NCT’s loyalty bonus schemes can be supported both by magnetic stripe cards and EMV-compliant chip cards. The SmartVista solution, originally designed in compliance with EMV specifications, provides the personalization of loyalty applications on chip cards and the management of bonus accounts.

The integration of BPC’s and NCT’s products will help retailers and banks fully leverage the opportunities provided by EMV technology. The retailers will get an easy-to-use and effective solution for launching loyalty programs while the banks will be able to increase the volume of non-cash operations in their acquiring network and to make their offerings more competitive by adding value to the card and getting customers to use their cards more often.

“The collaboration agreement with NCT is a significant step forward in expanding BPC’s partner relations and SmartVista’s functional wealth. We are pleased to work cooperatively with NCT, a leader in developing EMV card based solutions, whose products are employed by major banks and industrial companies of Russia and the CIS,” said Sergey Krukov, Deputy CEO, BPC. “The integration of SmartVista with NCT’s solutions will benefit our clients who will be able to implement loyalty bonus schemes gaining a wide acceptance today.”