Business Challenge

Visa cards are the world’s most widely used form of electronic payment. Visa is the world’s leading payment brand and largest consumer payment system, enabling banks to provide their consumer and merchant customers with a wide variety of payment alternatives. Within the United States, nearly 14,000 financial institutions issue 429 million Visa cards, accounting for more than USD 1.1 trillion in annual transaction volume.

Over the past three years, Intel® Solution Services provided application assessment, business process analysis, reengineering services and Web services development assistance to Visa USA. In the course of their ongoing work, Intel Solution Services consultants recognized that the site could be improved based on future needs.

With the significant technical improvements over the past few years, several of the site’s programs were in need of redevelopment, which also required extensive maintenance.

In addition, because a services firm hosted the site, the cost impact of these issues was highly visible. Application maintenance, hosting, licensing and internal administrative staff costs were all elements that could be improved.

The Intel Solution Services team suggested alternative approaches to the Web site that could dramatically lower costs, improve availability and streamline maintenance. Restructuring would ultimately provide better service to Visa USA’s members and stakeholders.

Says Melyssa Barrett, director of issuer risk at Visa USA, “Intel the project requirements and defined phases that could be Solution Services has a track record of delivering quality delivered incrementally: results—on time and within budget—using a range of methodologies that produce valuable results. They are also neutral about the choice of hardware and software vendors, so we trust their recommendations. As a result, we were very comfortable asking Intel Solution Services consultants to move forward with their recommendations."

Business Solution Intel

Intel Solution Services consultants analyzed the current environment and considered two approaches to improving the cost-effectiveness and scalability.