BUILDING FROM THE GROUND UP

The development team at CoreCard was presented with a unique opportunity to build a new card management platform. Even though they possessed years of experience working with legacy card management applications, they realized that they needed to evaluate all of their options before building a new system. The team realized that here was a rare chance to build for the future, an opportunity to wipe the slate clean, start fresh and create a platform that would support card management companies using current thinking and modern methodologies.

MOVING AWAY FROM THE MAINFRAME

The first item of business was determining what platform to build on. Legacy systems built on mainframe technology have always been the system of choice for large card processors. As the team researched current trends they were surprised to see the large number of smaller companies entering various segments of the card market. Many of these companies were forced to turn to third party processors because they could not afford the cost involved in licensing and running a legacy system. CoreCard’s development team realized that these smaller businesses would need a product that could be run on server based technology and be platform independent. They quickly realized that the larger card processing companies would benefit from the reduced costs from using scalable, server based technology. 

MODULARIZATION INCREASES CHOICE

While interviewing the smaller card management companies the development team learned that not every card provider would need all of the functionality that the larger card companies would require. For instance, if the card provider was not going to support merchant acquiring they could forgo licensing software that supports that functionality. The natural benefit to having a choice of modules is lower license fees, along with lower costs for the hardware needed to handle the application.

CENTRALIZING KEY FUNCTIONALITY

Modularization of software can create other issues and the team quickly found a new challenge. They were presented with the question of how to handle functionality that is shared by the various modules. For instance workflow may be required in each module, so a choice of how to develop and deploy that functionality needed to be made. The development team at CoreCard elected to place functionality common to all modules into a single platform they named CoreENGINE. The practical benefit to this shared approach is a reduction in the total amount of code that needs to be written for the modules and in turn is loaded on the hardware running the applications.

DEPLOYING ON A SINGLE CODE BASE

Many companies today build their systems with software from multiple software providers. This approach creates the challenge of integrating multiple code bases. CoreCard's modules are all built on a single code base, so even though the system is divided into smaller modules when a customer deploys all of the modules they do so on a single code base. The benefit of this to companies licensing the CoreCard solution is that they do not need to manage integrating multiple software products to obtain a complete card management system.  

TABLES AND PARAMETERS PROVIDE MORE CONTROL

Older legacy system are known to be inflexible, adding new programs takes time, as programmers hard code in the parameters. The team at CoreCard eliminated this bottle neck by adding tables and system parameters throughout the system to control all aspects of system. By creating a hierarchical system of tables, users of the software can quickly create new programs. This means new offering quickly move from concept, to test and into production. Responding to market needs is easier and quicker thanks to this approach to the tables and parameters.   

BENEFITS OF REAL-TIME PROCESSING

In the card world, real-time authorizations are required and CoreCard delivers this functionality in a scalable way allowing companies to add servers to handle demand as it grows. On the flip side CoreCard also allows companies to process all transactions in real-time. Adding real-time posting creates a number of  immediate benefits. The first benefit is to the impact on the hardware required, with batch processing, a mainframe computer would be required to crunch thorough the posting data each night. By posting the transactions as they are received the team found they could eliminate the need for the power provided by the mainframe each evening. The second benefit to real-time posting is it creates a system where it is possible to offer a 24X7 environment that customers could access to obtain real-time information about their accounts online via the internet. This ability, real-time web access, has now become an expected standard in the industry and was made possible because of real-time transaction posting.

BUILDING FOR THE FUTURE

In this day and age future proofing any product may be next to impossible and at CoreCard the development team is not happy resting on past accomplishments. With the help of current customers and a team of product managers dedicated to following market trends, the development team is actively evaluating the information they are receiving. This data is being used to add functionality to the various modules to keep them current with new regulations and offerings. The team is also making sure that as development methodologies mature and new hardware is introduced they research the benefits of each to determine any impact it might have on the development of future offering.

OUR TECHNOLOGY COMMITMENT

Our goal is to continue finding ways to make the best use of technology to provide our customers with the most comprehensive card management platform for the best price in the market. Our current product line was created because our team was dedicated to the idea of building a suite of products for the future. As we continue to add new features and functionality to our products our team will by keeping an eye of the future so that we and our customers can continue to grow.