Despite the Bank of Portugal’s attempts to push a fledgling technology start-up out of the cosy ATM transfers market, Easypay is to set up 50 of its own ATMs this year and will enter six overseas markets by the year end.
Easypay’s ATMs will be branded ‘abypay’ and the company is the first Portuguese competitor for the increasingly expensive Multibanco network.
"The plan for 2017 will be very aggressive, with the public able to use the abypay app by the end of the first quarter. In the second quarter we will enter the merchants network and install our first ATM in Portugal," said Easypay’s president, Sebastião de Lencastre, noting that abypay is 100% Portuguese.
"We have developed a unique, revolutionary, worldwide solution that enables instant cash transfers to any part of the world and in any currency, in seconds and at a cost of a few cents," said the leader of Easypay, which finally received its registration from the Bank of Portugal in 2007.
Easypay was launched in 2000 but only started seven years later due to ‘regulatory issues,’ caused primarily by a reticent Bank of Portugal, keen to protect the status quo.
The company manages payment systems, has 4,000 client companies (such as EMEL, Nestlé, Renova, Fitness Hut and Unicef) and is lean, with only 17 workers.
In 2016, Easypay transferred €84 million in 3.1 million transactions, a significant increase compared to 2015 (€64 million 2.1 million transactions).
"We are a modern bank and we are launching into the third money revolution," said Sebastião de Lencastre, who used to work at Unicre, the company specialising in the management and issuance of payment cards.
Through abypay, Easypay will own the first Portuguese ATM network competing with the Multibanco network which is managed by SIBS.
In addition, Sebastião de Lencastre considered that in Portugal "SIBS and Unicre are the biggest barriers to Fintechs (Financial technology start-ups) and criticised the protective position taken by the Bank of Portugal on the evolution of these specialised electronic payment companies.
Sebastião de Lencastre said that Easypay's presence at the recent Web Summit in Lisbon, on a stand between SIBS and Facebook, helped the company get 800 working contacts over the three days in November 2016.
Easypay is just the sort of company the government is trying to encourage but the Bank of Portugal's tactic, in delaying a licence for seven years, shows that the old school are still keen to preserve their territory.
See: www.easypay.com
