Temenos (SIX: TEMN), the market-leading provider of mission-critical solutions to the financial services industry, today announces the expansion of its cloud-based services in Mexico with the launch of the T24 country Model Bank for Mexico in the Microsoft Azure cloud.

Temenos has been working with Microsoft Azure since 2011, when together they were first providers to put core banking in the cloud. There are two early adopters for the service In Mexico, namely Servicios y Financiamiento Agrícola, S.A. de C.V. (SeFia); and Sociedad Financiera Campesina S.A. de C.V. (Soficam).

By offering core banking in the cloud, Temenos is enabling financial organisations to operate with lower costs and more flexibility and, by extension, help them to provide under-served communities with access to financial services.

By deploying a Mexico-specific modern core banking solution as a service on the Microsoft Azure platform, Temenos can offer the functionality to address local service needs, including assistance with regulation and compliance requirements, while removing the high cost, lengthy timeline and inherent risk of building or licensing a fully-functional, compliant technology platform in-house.

SeFia, one of two early adopters, was established in 2005 in Mexico and has a presence in the states of Chihuahua, Coahuila, Durango, Guanajuato and Queretaro. SeFia helps its customers finance the purchase of machinery and equipment in the agricultural sector. Their product portfolio is designed to facilitate farmers, cattle ranchers and builders in obtaining loans that allow them to expand their businesses and generate a positive impact on the local economy.

SeFia COO, Luis Fernando Rosado, said:
“We have in T24 a comprehensive solution for our loan portfolio administration, the software is quick and easy to use and the information it provides is of high quality.”
Soficam, another early adopter, was established in 2008 in Mexico and has a presence in 19 states. Soficam grew out of a strategic alliance between agricultural and banking sectors, offering loans to small producers in the Mexican agricultural and fishing industries. Soficam is related to the Confederacion Nacional Campesina, an organization formed by 2.5 million affiliates classified in 17 agricultural productive branches across Mexico.
Soficam CIO, Alejandro Hatchett Cruz, said:
 
“Accessing T24 in the cloud allows us to deliver financial services to our clients without the complexity and expense of in-house IT systems.” 
 
Enrique O’Reilly, Regional Director, Temenos Latin America, said:
 
“We are delighted to kick off 2015 with the launch of our award-winning core banking solution in the cloud for Mexico. Deploying banking technology from a cloud-based platform solves significant issues for our clients by allowing them to launch quickly, to turn fixed into variable costs and to operate profitability at much lower levels of scale. The work we are doing in Mexico with Microsoft builds on our experience in other countries around the world such as Nigeria, Kenya and Myanmar.”
Ernesto Neve, Solutions Director for Financial Services, Microsoft, commented:
“We are very excited to bring Financial Institutions in México the best cloud platform available. Our cloud platform offers the best in IaaS, PaaS and SaaS, as well as compliance with the Mexican banking regulator CNBV’s requirements for institutions working with cloud services. Our security, privacy and integrity model enables Financial Institutions to feel confident when moving to our Azure platform.“