IBM today announced that Comepay, a leading provider of self-service payment kiosks in Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), has selected an IBM System z10 mainframe to run its core business operations. Comepay joins a growing list of companies in growth markets deploying IBM mainframes for the fist time including China Internet Network Information Center, Korea's BC Card and Dongbu Insurance and The First National Bank of Namibia.

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Comepay currently operates 200 kiosks in 11 regions of Russia enabling consumers to pay for a range of services including internet, digital TV, mobile phones and utilities. The new system will support Comepay with further business expansion strategy across the country and help it to manage a predicted three-fold increase in transactions from 10,000 to 30,000 per second.

"Shifting our operations to IBM's System z will enable us to create a reliable base for business growth," said Ruslan Stepanenko, CIO, Comepay. "With the new infrastructure we can grow our business and provide 24/7 services and support for our clients."

"The mainframe is traditionally known for supporting large enterprises, but System z is adaptable and can also help organizations in emerging markets manage their businesses efficiently and effectively," said Tom Rosamilia, System z general manager, IBM Systems and Technology Group. "Comepay joins a growing list of companies in emerging economies, including in China, Korea and Namibia, running their businesses on a mainframe."

The performance and virtualization capabilities of System z, running z/os, will enable Comepay to process the growing amount of transactions and meet business-critical data processing requirements without increasing the total cost of ownership. IBM DB2 and WebSphere MQ software will enable Comepay to enhance its information management capabilities while improving the security and reliability of its transaction processing center.

Comepay is planning to migrate all data to the new System z mainframe by the end of Q2, 2010.

  About Comepay
  For further information about ComePay, visit http://www.comepay.ru/.

  About IBM
  For further information, visit http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/smarter/



  Contacts:

  Artur Trapizonyan
  IBM Russia/CIS
  +7(495) 775 88 00 ext. 2652
  artur@ru.ibm.com

  Ron Favali
  IBM
  813-356-4010
  favali@us.ibm.com

First Call Analyst:
FCMN Contact: favali@us.ibm.com

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SOURCE: IBM