Acquiring platforms built to scale and settle cleanly
We help acquirers, processors and payment facilitators design, modernize and run the platforms that accept, route and settle every merchant transaction, from the gateway to the final reconciliation.
What our clients are up against
Legacy hosts holding growth back
Monolithic acquirer hosts make it slow to add new merchants, payment methods or markets, and expensive to scale for peak volumes.
Fragmented routing and settlement
Multiple gateways, switches and settlement files often grow side by side, leaving reconciliation manual and interchange costs hard to see.
Rising merchant expectations
Merchants expect fast onboarding, self-service portals, every payment method and clear reporting, all while the platform stays compliant.
How we cover Merchant Acquiring
Gateway and platform architecture
Design or modernize the platform that sits between merchants and the networks.
- Merchant acquiring platform design and modernization
- Payment gateway and multi-acquirer API orchestration
- POS, ePOS and mPOS integration frameworks
- Alternative payment methods: wallets, buy now pay later (BNPL) and crypto
- Multi-currency, cross-border and dynamic currency conversion (DCC)
- Cloud migration and horizontal scaling of acquirer hosts
Switching and routing
Make every authorization fast, available and correctly routed.
- Authorization switch architecture and high availability
- Real-time transaction routing, switching and load balancing
- ISO 8583 and ISO 20022 message transformation and routing
- Terminal Management System (TMS) design and deployment
Settlement and reconciliation
Turn clearing, fees and exceptions into an automated, auditable flow.
- Acquirer settlement, clearing and interchange fee calculation
- Reconciliation automation and exception handling
- Merchant analytics and business intelligence dashboards
Merchants, risk and compliance
Onboard merchants quickly while keeping risk and audits under control.
- Merchant onboarding workflows and MID management
- Merchant portal and self-service platform design
- Risk scoring, fraud detection and chargeback management
- PCI DSS compliance for acquiring platforms
Ways to work with us
Architecture review
An independent assessment of your current acquiring stack with a prioritized modernization roadmap.
Platform design & delivery
Senior architects who design the target platform and work alongside your teams and vendors through go-live.
Team training
Hands-on programs that bring your engineers and operations teams up to speed on acquiring end to end.
Build your team's capability
Our acquiring modules can be delivered as a standalone program or tailored to your platform.
Request informationTraining modules
- Acquiring Fundamentals: Merchants, Processors, Gateways and Networks
- Authorization Switch Architecture and High Availability Design
- ISO 8583 Message Mapping, Testing and Network Integration
- Payment Gateway Architecture, Routing and API Security
- TMS Platform Design and Terminal Certification Workshop
- Merchant Risk Management and Fraud Detection
- Settlement, Clearing and Reconciliation Automation
- Merchant Onboarding and Lifecycle Management
- PCI DSS Compliance for Acquirers
Services, case studies and tools
Can you work with our existing acquiring vendor?
Yes. Most of our engagements involve one or more existing vendors. We act as your independent architect: we define the target design, write the integration requirements, review vendor deliverables and help your team hold every party to the same plan. We don't resell platforms, so our recommendations follow your needs.
We want to move our acquirer host to the cloud. Where do we start?
Start with an architecture review that maps your current host, its integrations and its compliance scope. From there we design the target architecture and a phased migration that keeps authorizations running throughout, typically moving lower-risk services first and the authorization path last.
Do you support both ISO 8583 and ISO 20022?
Yes. Many acquiring platforms now run both: ISO 8583 toward the card networks and ISO 20022 for account-to-account and real-time payments. We design the message transformation, mapping and routing layers so both work from one platform.
Can you help us prepare for a PCI DSS assessment?
Yes. We help you reduce PCI DSS scope through architecture choices such as tokenization and network segmentation, then prepare documentation and controls ahead of your Qualified Security Assessor's review.
Let's design your next acquiring platform
Talk to a senior consultant about your acquiring roadmap.