UTI Bank To Add 1000 ATM's With Sharing Agreement
By Julia Fernandes
Mumbai, Feb 9, 2004

UTI Bank is on a roll. Touted as India's third largest ATM network, the bank appears to be on an ATM buying spree, considering its highly ambitious plans to expand its network by adding more than 1000 ATMs through a series of tie-ups lined up for this fiscal.

Speaking to CXOtoday, VK Ramani, president-IT, UTI Bank, said, "When the concept of ATM first took off in India, banks had incurred a heavy investment. Today, such tie-ups not only help us in leveraging our technology, but also enable us to minimize our respective costs substantially.'

Interface between various databases would be facilitated via a switch-to-switch network. The bank currently follows the ISO 8583 messaging standards, revealed Ramani.

Raising the issue of security, he clarified, "When there is a switch-to-switch network, there are certain standards that need to be strictly adhered to. Sometimes banks in their efforts to cut costs may not strictly adhere to the norms. This raises the need for setting up of an independent identity, a kind of a third party audit to ensure that banks are strictly meeting the required standards."

While speaking of the emergence of several new models, Ramani mentioned the concept of a single entity, more on the lines of a sole national network, or a central service provider dishing out ATM services on behalf of banks spread across all sectors.

The bank currently serves its customers through a network of 1,164 ATMs via a mesh of 223 branches and extension counters spread across 101 cities and towns, all routed through a centralized data center in Mumbai.

The bank had previously entered into ATM-sharing arrangements with ABN-Amro Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Karur Vysya Bank, Bank of Rajasthan and IndusInd Bank. It is also part of a multilateral ATM-sharing arrangement through Euronet with Standard Chartered Bank, Citibank and IDBI Bank.

As talks are still underway, UTI has declined to name the banks involved in the new ATM sharing agreement.