Pelican expands pan-European Open Banking API interoperability

Pelican, the provider of AI-powered payments and financial crime compliance solutions for banks and corporates, has announced the further extension of its API Interoperability solution, with expanded support for the six most popular Open Banking API standards.

Support now extends to the UK’s OBWG, France’s STET and the Berlin Group, together with the Czech ČSOB, and the Polish and Slovakian APIs.

The Pelican API Interoperability solution enables Third-Party Providers (TPPs) to access PSD2 Payment Initiation and Account Information services, and to seamlessly connect to financial institutions implementing any of the popular Open Banking APIs, regardless of whether they are native TPPs, or banks wishing to operate as TPPs in an Open Banking environment.

In contrast to API ‘aggregation’ hub approaches, which restrict financial institutions to using a single, and often proprietary API, the Pelican solution uniquely enables organisations to adopt any of the popular PSD2-compliant APIs and to connect to all European banks, regardless of the different popular API standards the banks may be using.

Pelican’s interoperability capabilities are also attractive to banks wishing to internally standardise on one single API, but with a need to offer multiple API standards to reach a wider pan-European marketplace, or for banks that have already published a specific API and wish to support various other API standards across different business lines or in different jurisdictions.

Parth Desai, founder and CEO of Pelican, commented, “With the expansion of our API interoperability support, Pelican will enable banks and TPPs to seamlessly reach 500 million potential customers across Europe through any of the popular PSD2-compliant APIs.

“Our interoperability solution is part of the comprehensive Pelican Open Banking Hub that delivers a true pan-European service, removing all the technical complexity of achieving multiple API support and connectivity to customers’ accounts. This allows TPPs and banks to focus on delivering their core proposition to customers, while Pelican takes the pain out of connecting to multiple API standards.”

Connecting the dots

Desai went on to add that Open Banking presents many potential benefits for SMEs and large corporations – but only if its not hindered by a fragmented API landscape.

“Open Banking solutions that are capable of integrating with corporations’ accounting systems to automate business payments and reconciliations can add real value and increase operational efficiencies, especially for larger multi-banked corporates. This potential is however hindered by the fragmented API landscape across Europe, with a need of organisations to possibly connect to multiple different API formats, such as UK’s OBWG, France’s STET, or the popular Berlin Group API.

“The API Interoperability solution provided by Pelican can assist all Open Banking participants, providing a seamless conversion ‘switch’ that harmonises the differences between various APIs, enabling the corporate treasury to achieve the maximum benefits from a truly open and harmonious API ecosystem.”

Pelican’s subsidiary company, PelicanPay, is a regulated TPP providing additional Payment Initiation and Account Information Services solutions to SMEs, corporates and fintechs.