Several Asia-Pacific financial institutions have teamed with IBM Corp and Visa International Inc to create online banking and e- commerce standards for the region. The alliance counts ABN Amro Holding NV, the Bank of Western Australia, Infomas, Kookmin Bank, Royal Bank and St George Bank among its members, Dow Jones reports. The allies plan to make their standards interoperable with those of the Integrion Financial Network (http://www.integrion.net), a similar partnership between North American banks, Visa and IBM. Not surprisingly, the target platform for the alliance’s ecommerce standards is the IBM Global Network. The partners also hope to promote a messaging protocol to simplify business-to-consumer electronic data exchange. Initial services should include funds transfer and electronic bill payment, with securities trading and loan applications being offered in the not-too-distant future.
