In the delivery of remote deposit capture services to large organizations, it’s suddenly a crowded field.
It seems that everyone is depositing checks with their smartphones these days. This convenience for customers, who are saved a trip to the branch or ATM, is also a win for FIs — which save on the cost of processing paper checks at the branch and ATM.
For several years Mitek has carried the banner for mobile remote deposit capture (RDC) and more recently, for additional image-banking products like mobile photo bill pay and mobile photo account-opening. but now new entrants are crowding the stage — will they cost Mitek business or are there enough customers to go around?
Mitek suddenly has competition.
Kofax has a long history in imaging for the back office, and recently stepped into mobile imaging as well. Now, with its comprehensive mobile imaging platform, which ties together several mobile imaging functions in one system, it is a serious contender for enterprise business. Kofax recently released the news that it had sold a license to a Top Five U.S. financial institution. (When the “Top Five” label is used, suspicion immediately falls on US Bancorp, the nations’s fifth-largest bank. Otherwise Kofax could claim one of the “Big Four” institutions. UPDATE: A source at US Bank indicates this is not the case, but Bank Innovation is waiting for further confirmation of that.)
A newer competitor is RDM, with its Simply Deposit Mobile platform. RDM, located in Waterloo, Ontario, has ties to four of the Top 10 financial institutions in the U.S. with its office imaging systems, and, like Kofax and Mitek, is looking beyond the boundaries of the financial services industry for customers.
The landscape has changed for Mitek, which a year ago stood virtually alone in serving the imaging needs for large financial institutions. With the imaging battlefield extending to the insurance and healthcare industries, and unknown territories beyond, the stakes are high.
Scott Carter, Mitek’s chief marketing officer, pointed out to Bank Innovation that, “RDM is a valued partner of ours and not a competitor. The mobile RDC ecosystem is complex; the various solution providers tend to be complementary rather than mutually exclusive.” He also said that the major banks working with Mitek continued to be enthusiastic about its imaging products and that Mitek, which “invented the science behind mobile deposit” and holds key patents in the technology, won’t take its market-leading position for granted.
Learn more about what’s next in banking at Bank Innovation 2014 on March 3-4 in Seattle. Request an invitation here.