LankaClear rebrands for the new era in payment arena

By Shanuka Tissera

The new corporate logo for LankaClear launched yesterday symbolises the infinity symbol meaning eternity, ongoing renewal and is a metaphor for continuous improvement.

The company which is jointly owned by the Central Bank of Sri Lanka and the licensed commercial banks continuously improves its systems and processes, keeping abreast with the advancing technology with an ultimate aim of passing the benefits of a more efficient payment system to the general public as well as its stakeholders.

LankaClear Chairperson Priyantha Liyanage explained how we are in a new era of money: “The role of LankaClear has to change due to technology payments. We have been subjected to good growth and we are very satisfied, we cannot stop moving forward as the new developments in the payment arena are always growing.”

The company did not give much publicity until recently; it is time to educate the public the Chairperson shared. She further stated that from the beginnings in 2002 as the National Cheque Clearing House, the company has steadily progressed to the status of national payments infrastructure service provider.

With the increasing demand for more efficient and convenient payment systems, the scope and the role that LankaClear plays would significantly increase capturing a wider area of payment channels and products.

"We are very much excited about the new role we are required to play and look forward to yet another new era of excellence as an important service provider in the financial sector with a completely new brand image," she said. LankaClear is one of the most successful public private partnerships in the country. Since 2002, following the divestment of the Sri Lanka Automated Clearing House, the company has consistently brought economies of scale to the banking industry by combining the efficiency and dynamism of the private sector with the stability and security characterised by the public sector.

LankaClear CEO Sunimal Weerasooriya stated that as per the global trends of the payment systems, it is found that credit cards and debit cards are considered as the important payment products and the internet and ATMs are treated as the most important payment channels. Commenting on the trends in the Asian countries, he stated that although cash and cheque usage is higher than the North American and European countries, it is expected that the card based products and other electronics payment methods will have significant growth.

He added that the trends in the payment industry would go beyond the card based payments to contactless and mobile payment modes and to have cross border connectivity for greater customer convenience and efficiency of payments.

Quoting an example from a country closer to us, Weerasooriya stated that the national card switch in Malaysia operated by MEPS has spearheaded the East Asian Payment Network which links the national switches of Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand, China and Malaysia enabling cross-border connectivity for ATM/Debit Cards. He added that it is envisaged that this would be a reality in the SAARC Region also in the near future.

Weerasooriya explaining LankaClear’s plans to face the challenges of the next decade stated, “LankaClear would create the backbone infrastructure for all future electronic payments in the country and we believe that a common infrastructure would avoid the duplication of infrastructure and provide the best benefits to the financial institutions and the public through economies of scale.”

“The new branding comes during an exciting time for LankaClear who celebrated the 10th Anniversary recently,” LankaClear Brand Manager Thesara Jayawardane added with much enthusiasm. “There is no better time to introduce our new logo and branding than today. Our logo demonstrated not only where LankaClear stands today, but also where we are heading. Our new branding position tells our existing customers and future customers, that we offer Asia’s best performing, most versatile and reliable payment infrastructure that is backed by a strong commitment to our products and the end user. We want our nation to know that we are moving forward with both of these commitments at the forefront. We are poised to reliably serve our customers’ every need today and in the future because we will continue to put them first. LankaClear continues to move forward as an even stronger organisation. We have a well respected name behind the company as a recognised leader in the financial industry. With our new branding, we will be able to better communicate the full spectrum of what we provide to our customers, what they mean to us and what we mean to them.”

LankaClear’s Head of Operations Harsha Wanigatunga elaborated on some of the security aspects of the company. “We have a primary site, backup site and since 2008, we have a recovery site. So in the event of an emergency within an emergency, LankaClear is still very much capable of functioning.”

A brief history was given to help us understand why we are moving towards this contactless payment age, initially we had the barter system, then it moved to a system of trading precious metals, we have survived the cash cycle, now we are moving to an efficient and reliable card based system. With global uncertainty at its peak, LankaClear is continually developing its system so that if the bill in America, HR 549 ‘Audit the Fed’ gets passed, Sri Lanka will be more than prepared.