Cooperative’s customers will benefit from additional financial crime prevention services and faster time to market
Dubai, 30 March 2014 – SWIFT announces the acquisition of Omnicision, the UK-based provider of financial crime prevention services and solutions. The acquisition underscores SWIFT’s commitment to invest in its compliance offering and will enable SWIFT to grow its Sanctions Testing service and further expand its compliance services, leveraging Omnicision’s technology, expertise and product pipeline.
Under terms of the agreement, SWIFT acquires Omnicision’s existing Sanctions Testing product, as well as a number of new initiatives under development. The acquisition further strengthens SWIFT’s compliance services unit by adding financial crime prevention experts with specialist knowledge in areas such as sanctions, AML and Know Your Customer (KYC).
Gottfried Leibbrandt, CEO of SWIFT, said: “Omnicision has developed a great sanctions testing product which will enhance our compliance solutions range. The combination of Omnicision’s valuable expertise with SWIFT’s world-class security, reliability and operational excellence will enable us to further boost our growth in the compliance area.”
Ian Horobin, CEO of Omnicision, said: “We are excited to join SWIFT at this important stage in the development of its financial crime compliance services. SWIFT’s unique position in the financial community and unrivalled global network will allow us to further innovate and deliver tangible benefits to SWIFT users worldwide.”
The Omnicision acquisition marks a further step in the expansion of SWIFT’s compliance services portfolio. SWIFT recently created a dedicated Compliance Services unit to manage its growing compliance services offering and in January 2014 announced the creation of a global Know Your Customer (KYC) Registry, a centralised utility for the collection and distribution of standard information required by banks as part of their due diligence processes.
Yawar Shah, Chairman of SWIFT, said: “The industry is counting on SWIFT to provide innovative solutions in the financial crime compliance area. The Omnicision acquisition marks another key milestone in the expansion of SWIFT’s compliance services strategy, and demonstrates our commitment to making the necessary investment to address the community’s needs in this critical area.”