ACI Worldwide Revolutionises Payments at Pay360
In an exclusive interview with FinTech Magazine at Pay360, Andrew Moseley, Head of Solution Consulting at ACI Worldwide, shared insights on the transformation of payments infrastructure, regulatory challenges, and the rising importance of AI in fraud prevention.
Creating unified payment platforms
Financial institutions across Europe are increasingly focused on consolidating fragmented payment systems into unified platforms. According to Moseley, ACI's approach to modernisation centres on integration.
"Our view is very much to look at modernisation as the ability to bring payments together into a single, highly secure, highly scalable, highly resilient platform that manages all payment types," says Andrew.
"Whether it's a card payment, a high-value payment, or an instant payment – all managed on the same infrastructure."
This consolidated approach delivers significant advantages beyond technical improvements.
Built on cloud-native architecture with a modern tech stack, these platforms enhance serviceability while reducing the time to market for new products and services compared to siloed systems.
"Moving away from the old-style transfer methods that need account numbers and sort codes, towards the ability to use aliases like mobile phones or email addresses – it just makes payments much more accessible"
The evolution of instant payments
The regulatory landscape continues to drive significant changes in payment processing requirements, particularly around speed.
"It's a fantastic and really exciting time to be in payments right now," Andrew explains. "Our expectation is that regulation will drive that mindset change.
"The requirement to process a payment in 10 seconds, potentially down to five seconds – that's a big ask, but from a customer perspective, whether you're in the EU or even in the UK, more instant payments are better."
ACI Worldwide has been tracking instant payment growth globally through its "Prime Time for Real-Time" report, which has analysed over 50 countries for the past five years.
While regions like India with UPI and Brazil with Pix have seen explosive growth, Andrew notes that the UK and EU have progressed somewhat more slowly – though the potential remains substantial.
"Moving away from the old-style transfer methods that need account numbers and sort codes, towards the ability to use aliases like mobile phones or email addresses – it just makes payments much more accessible," he adds.
AI-powered fraud prevention
As payment infrastructure modernises, so too do the threats facing it. The rise of AI-powered fraud presents a significant challenge for the industry.
"PWC recently said that by the end of this year, they expect around 50% of all frauds will be AI-driven," Andrew warns.
"We've got to fight fire with fire. It's really important that from a real-time fraud detection perspective, you have that AI-powered capability."
While ACI has been developing AI-powered fraud prevention for over two decades, Andrew emphasises that the quality of data remains crucial, as does the continual evolution of machine learning models.
"The models can't be static – they've got to be retrained because data becomes obsolete very quickly," he explains.
"If you launch a model for fraud prevention, it will become ineffective within six months. So regular retraining is essential to maintain your ability to fight fraud effectively."
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