Radiant Systems, Prism Holdings join forces

Prism Holdings Ltd, the Johannesburg Securities Exchange-listed secure electronic transaction technologies and services company, has recently joined forces with Radiant Systems, Inc (NASDAQ:RADS), to deliver secure outdoor payment solutions to the petroleum industry.

A cooperation agreement will result in South African Prism`s robust OEM Outdoor Payment Terminal (OPT) being offered as part of Radiant`s advanced suite of petroleum forecourt products.

Gary Landers, General Manager of Radiant`s Petroleum and Convenience Retail Business Unit in Asia Pacific, says Radiant conducted an extensive evaluation of the market before selecting Prism as its business partner for the supply of an OPT.

"Outdoor payment with EMV-compliant devices is an important part of the Radiant solution for petroleum and convenience store retailers in Asia," said Gary Landers, General Manager of Radiant`s Petroleum and Convenience business unit in Asia Pacific.

"Offering Prism`s secure and reliable technology delivers a high-value, affordable solution to the market," he adds.

This partnership has already resulted in an arrangement with an international oil company to pilot the Radiant-Prism OPT solution in preparation for the roll-out across petrol station forecourts in Asia.

The Prism and Radiant OPT offering is respected in the market because of its flexibility and core capability to accept and process all past, current and foreseeable industry payment technologies - including magnetic stripe and chip (ICC or integrated circuit) cards. It adheres to the latest payment card and security standards such as EMV level 2, Visa PED as well as the International Forecourt Standards Forum (IFSF) protocols and the National Association of Consumers Stores (NACS) communications protocols.

Alvin Els, CEO of Prism, says the considerations for card acceptance and PIN entry devices in general and unattended self-service devices in the petroleum sector specifically, have become significantly more complex as the global payments industry begins to migrate from magnetic stripe debit and credit cards to chip card technology.

"The main reason for this move is related to security and fraud. Chip cards are significantly more difficult to clone than their magnetic stripe counterparts, making them inherently more secure. But they have other benefits too including the ability to support alternative payment schemes such as electronic purse, stored value and prepaid; as well as additional applications such as loyalty.

"However, while the hardware and software demands of accepting and processing payments initiated by magnetic stripe cards are minimal - the demands on chip card solutions are considerably higher because of the complexity of chip card`s much larger data interchange and the active read/write coupled with active authentication and data security," he explains.

"Furthermore, technical interoperability standards between card and card acceptance devices are minimal and relatively trivial for magnetic stripe card technology, as opposed to complex and intricate for the industry`s EMV (EuroPay, MasterCard, Visa) chip card standards mandated for chip debit and credit card migration.

"Prism has wide experience in the chip card arena with EMV level 1 and level 2 Type Approval on several of its products. The combination of our experience in this field and Radiant`s leadership in the delivery of petroleum industry forecourt solutions will result in a formidable team, capable of meeting the growing self-service needs of the petroleum industry," Els concludes.