New IFX Forum Architecture Chair Drives Adoption of its XML Specifications for the Financial Services Industry

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New IFX Forum Architecture Chair Drives Adoption of its XML Specifications for the Financial Services Industry

March 6, 2002, Alexandria, Va

March 6, 2002, Alexandria, Va. - The Interactive Financial eXchange (IFX) Forum, charged with creating Extensible Markup Language (XML) based messages that support multiple types of financial services, appointed as its new Architecture Committee Chair Jim Shain, senior architect at ALLTEL Information Services located in Little Rock, Ark. The Architecture Committee serves as the IFX Forum's coordinating body that ensures interoperability across all industries affected by financial transactions and creates a family of IFX specifications that is consistent, efficient and easy-to-implement.

Shain's work in developing ALLTEL's numerous Internet banking products complements his leadership role with the IFX Forum as it establishes open financial XML standards. Also heading up ALLTEL's IFX-based Internet banking product, Shain's early prototypes for ALLTEL eventually became the basis for the Spectrum electronic bill presentment (EBP) switch.

With the primary goal of increasing adoption of the IFX specification by concentrating on message content and alternative delivery mechanisms, Shain is also placing emphasis on crafting new service-oriented messages and enhancing the IFX payload with the Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP), which ultimately expands the reach of the IFX specification to trading partners that utilize the SOAP messaging format.

"IFX has an excellent set of core corporate business, retail banking and bill payment messages that support complex financial transactions worldwide," said Shain. "The imminent formation of a new IFX working group spearheaded by ACI Worldwide and NCR is concentrating on financial device communication. Developing such new messages as deposit account and loan account applications, numerous IFX Forum members like Credit Online, State Farm Insurance, Fiserv, ALLTEL, and e-Bank are working in a spirit of cooperation that makes IFX a leader in financial interoperability."

The next version of the IFX specification is slated for release in late spring 2002. The latest IFX specification - version 1.2 - is available free of charge at www.IFXForum.org, and features a wide range of functions that allow financial institutions and associated service providers to access account information, download credit card statements, transfer funds, process consumer and business payments, enable bill presentment, and improve customer service.

About the IFX Forum

The IFX Forum is made up of leading financial institutions, service providers and software vendors. Membership to the IFX Forum is open to anyone interested in contributing to the development of open financial standards that harness the power of XML. The IFX Forum is currently organized into the following working groups: Electronic Bill Presentment & Payment; Business Banking; Credit Application Processing; and Insurance. IFX Forum working groups, in concert with an Architecture Committee to coordinate their efforts, develop open Internet-compatible messages for all sectors of the financial services industry. To learn more about the benefits of IFX Forum membership, please visit www.IFXForum.org.

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