Chase Paymentech Solutions LLC plans to expand its European operations to capitalize on opportunities from the Single Euro Payments Area initiative, and it has hired an Irish e-commerce expert to lead that effort.
The Dallas merchant processor, a joint venture of First Data Corp. and JPMorgan Chase & Co., said Tuesday that the European expansion is one of a series of global and cross-border projects.
Chase Paymentech said it plans to announce a strategy this year for expanding in the Asia-Pacific region.
Madhavi Mantha, a senior analyst at the Boston research and consulting firm Celent LLC, said Sepa offers international processors a chance to gain share in a pan-European market.
"In the U.S. market, payment processing is relatively commoditized, where it is not so much in Europe and Asia," Ms. Mantha said. "With the harmonization that is taking place, processors see a lot of opportunity to go in there and take a position."
The European Central Bank says that there are more than 350 million cards in the region, which are used to make more than 12 billion purchases and 6 billion cash withdrawals a year.
Chase Paymentech hired Shane Fitzpatrick as managing director for the European Union. Mr. Fitzpatrick, who is based in Dublin, will report directly to Michael P. Duffy, the merchant acquirer's chief executive.
"Shane's leadership of our European expansion will serve to expand our capabilities to drive the growth of our merchants, who desire to operate without geographical payment borders," Mr. Duffy said in a press release.
Mr. Fitzpatrick was the founder of the financial consulting firm Zenith Finance International. Before that he had been the director and general manager for European operations at Time Warner Inc.'s America Online. He also is a co-founder and the chairman of the European Direct Response Forum, a trade group founded in 2003 for e-commerce merchants.
Chase Paymentech established its European unit in 2002, though it had been processing transactions there for more than 13 years before that. Late last year the venture signed a processing agreement with First Data International to use FDI's OmniPay platform.
First Data Corp. has made a series of acquisitions in Europe. In March it announced plans to buy the Polish payment processor Polcard SA for $325 million. That deal is expected to close this quarter. Polcard provides merchant processing, issuing, and automated teller machine driving services.
