Research area
Cloud Computing
Abstract
This project aims to transform FP7 research output into real-life tested and proven cloud technology. Software will be created for "Distributed Payment Processing", dubbed DiPP. DiPP technology is mature, tested by actual users, integrated with legacy systems of a bank and ready for business development. At the end of this project the exact cost-efficiency of this cloud technology is determined and can be used as the foundation to develop a solid business model for a start-up. Improving banking cost-efficiency has proven to be problematic. "Payments business roughly accounts for one third of the operational costs of the banks.", Jean-Claude Trichet, ECB President. Due to the mission-critical nature there is no place for unproven technology (99.999% availability). Mainframe batch processing is still important and only recently Internet Protocols (IPv4) for communication are applied (30-year old technology). Key problem is that mainframe capacity upgrades are millions of Euros operations. Paypal.com created an electronic wallet and payments on top of banking mainframe infrastructure using over 4000 Linux computers (2007 statistics). Despite Linux usage, costly proprietary software still dominates. Globally over 17 large electronic payment infrastructures exist, each moving over 1 trillion Euro/year with billions of transactions. We will combine cloud computing and Open Source style innovation to significantly improve 1) cost-efficiency 2) security+privacy and 3) provide Byzantine fault tolerance. Our DiPP software would be the first cloud-based elastic payment infrastructure. Our novel approach is to partner with existing banks and give away Open Source technology to disrupt this fragmented and proprietary industry. We have signed collaboration contracts with 2 regional banks (Norway, Slovenia) and ongoing discussions with a global top-10 bank. We will also contact other industrial players during the course of this project to further ensure the uptake of our innovations.
Partners
KTH/SICS (SE), TU Berlin (DE)
Time frame
2012+
Funding
250+ kEURO, EU EIT
People involved
Johan Pouwelse, Assistant Professor