Profile: Visa Inc. (V.N)

Visa Inc. (Visa), incorporated in May 2007, operates the retail electronic payments network and manages a global payments brand. It facilitates global commerce through the transfer of value and information among financial institutions, merchants, consumers, businesses and government entities. Visa provides financial institutions with product platforms encompassing consumer credit, debit, prepaid and commercial payments. VisaNet, the centralized, global processing platform, enables to provide financial institutions and merchants with a range of product platforms, transaction processing and related services.

The Company own, manage and promote payment brands, including Visa, Visa Electron, PLUS and Interlink, which it licenses to the customers for use in their payment programs. Visa offers a range of branded payments product platforms, which the customers use to develop and offer credit, debit, prepaid and cash access programs for cardholders. The Company provides transaction processing and services to the customers, through VisaNet, Visa Debit Processing Services and Visa Processing Services. It invests in new services and processing platforms, such as mobile payments and eCommerce.

Transaction Processing Services

Visa own and operate VisaNet, which consists of three synchronized processing centers, including a new data center on the east coast of the United States that replaced an existing data center in March 2009. Visa Europe operates one processing center in the United Kingdom, which is part of the synchronized system in accordance with the terms of the framework agreement with Visa Europe. VisaNet is built on a centralized architecture, enabling to view and analyze each authorization transaction processed in real time and provide information, such as risk scoring or loyalty applications, while the transaction data is being routed through the system.

The core processing services involve the routing of payment information and related data to facilitate the authorization, clearing and settlement of transactions between Visa issuers, which are the financial institutions that issue Visa cards to cardholders, and acquirers, which are the financial institutions that offer Visa network connectivity and payments acceptance services to merchants. In addition, Visa offers a range of processing services to support the customers’ Visa programs and to promote the growth and security of the Visa payments network. The Company processes all Visa transactions occurring in the United States, as well as Visa cross border transactions. Visa perform clearing and settlement through VisaNet for transactions involving an issuer that is located in Visa Europe’s region and an acquirer that is located in the rest of the world, or vice versa. In addition, it provides clearing and settlement services for Visa transactions occurring within Visa Europe’s region.

Other Value-Added Processing Services

The Company offers a range of services in certain countries, including risk management, debit issuer processing, loyalty services, dispute management and information services. It provides customers in certain countries with a number of risk-management services. These services, including Visa Advanced Authorization, include preventive, monitoring, investigative and predictive tools, which are intended to mitigate and help eliminate fraud at the cardholder and merchant level.

Visa Debit Processing Services (DPS) provides issuer processing services for participating the United States issuers of Visa debit, prepaid and automated teller machine (ATM) payment products. In addition to core issuer authorization processing, DPS offers card management services, exception processing, personal identification number (PIN) and ATM network gateways, call center services, fraud detection services and ATM terminal driving. Through Visa Processing Services Pte. Ltd. (VPS), the Company provide credit, debit and prepaid issuer processing services, including multicurrency processing functionality, outside the United States.

Visa offer loyalty services, such as the Visa Incentive Network and Visa Extras, that allow the customers to differentiate their Visa program offerings, increase the attractiveness of their Visa payment programs and improve their relationships with cardholders and merchants. The Company manage Visa Resolve Online, an automated Web-based service that allows the customers’ back-office analysts and customer service representatives to manage and resolve Visa transaction disputes. Visa provides the customers with a range of additional information-based business analytics and applications, as well as the transaction data and associated infrastructure required to support them.

Product Platforms

The Company offers a range of product platforms for the customers. The principal payment platforms enable credit, charge, deferred debit, debit and prepaid payments, as well as cash access, for consumers, businesses and government entities. The payment platforms are offered under the Visa, Visa Electron, Interlink and PLUS brands.

The consumer credit product platforms allow the issuers to offer deferred payment and financing products that can be customized to meet the needs of all consumer segments. The baseline consumer credit platform is marketed to the issuers as Visa Classic. In addition, the Company offer premium credit platforms, which enable the issuers to tailor programs to consumers requiring higher credit lines or enhanced benefits, such as loyalty programs. The premium consumer credit platforms are marketed to issuers, and in some cases, to cardholders, as Visa Gold, Visa Platinum, Visa Signature, Visa Signature Preferred and Visa Infinite.

The deposit access product platforms enable the issuers to offer consumer payment and cash access products that draw upon consumer deposit accounts, such as checking, demand deposit, asset or other pre-funded accounts. The primary consumer debit platform in the United States and many other countries uses the Visa brand mark. The customers in Asia Pacific (AP), Latin America and Caribbean (LAC), and Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa (CEMEA), can use the Visa Electron debit platform, which permits issuers to require all transactions initiated from the card to be authorized electronically. It is used by issuers offering payment programs to higher risk customer segments or in countries where electronic authorization is less prevalent. In the United States, Visa also provides the Interlink debit product platform, which generally requires a cardholder to enter PIN for authentication. Interlink may be enabled through an acceptance mark on a Visa debit card or issued as a standalone debit card.

The prepaid product platform enables issuers to offer products that access a pre-funded account, allowing cardholders to enjoy the convenience and security of a payment card in lieu of cash or checks. The prepaid platform includes gift, travel, youth, payroll, money transfer, corporate incentive, insurance reimbursement and government benefits cards. The customers can provide global cash access to their cardholders by issuing products accepted at Visa and PLUS branded ATMs. The Visa and Visa Electron branded cards offer customers cash access at ATMs, as well as at branches of the participating financial institution customers. The PLUS brand may also be included on issuers’ non-Visa branded cards to offer international cash access as a complement to domestic cash access services.

The commercial product platforms enable multinational, large, medium and small companies and government organizations to streamline payment processes, manage total spend, access information reporting, automate their supply chain, and reduce administrative costs. The Visa Business credit and debit platforms provide small businesses with cash flow tools, purchasing savings, rewards and management reporting. Visa Business Electron is an electronic authorization platform used in many countries outside North America.

The Visa Corporate platform offers payment options for employee travel and entertainment charges, including cash advances, and provides detailed transaction data as well as information and expense management tools. The Visa Purchasing platform provides card and non-card electronic payment products that allow companies to procure goods and services, while streamlining resource- and paper-intensive purchase order and invoice processing. The Visa Fleet platform offers a fuel and ground fleet-related payment program, including transaction detail and tax reclamation services. Through Syncada, the joint venture with US Bank, Visa market an integrated invoice processing, payment and financing platform for financial institutions to offer to their corporate and government commercial clients around the world. Visa offers government organizations unique information-and expense-management tools, employee-fraud-and misuse-management tools and strategic sourcing tools for their card programs. In certain countries, Visa offers specialized commercial products for specific government-sponsored programs, focusing agriculture, small-business, freight or construction loan programs.

The Company competes with MasterCard, American Express, Diners Club, JCB, Discover and China UnionPay.