NCR's APTRA OptiCash Software Deployed By Financial Group

NCR Corporation (NYSE:NCR) is capitalizing on the continuously changing concepts of traditional banking. The company recently announced that its APTRA OptiCash software will be deployed by Banca Comerciala Româna ("BCR"), a financial group in Romania and a member of Erste Group, across its network.

Founded in 1990, BCR was established by taking over the commercial operations of the National Bank of Romania. The company has more than 500 branches which provide banking services. In addition, it offers a cash pickup and delivery service for more than 1,500 corporate locations with an average volume of 2,000 orders per day. With the growing demand and increasing complexity of service offerings, it became difficult for BCR to monitor and take control of the overall cost of cash.

Thus, BCR inked the deal with NCR and will deploy the APTRA OptiCash software at its more than 2,600 ATMs. We believe that the installation will help year-over-year cost savings on cash management services. However, the financial terms of the deal have not been disclosed.

After evaluating the success rate of NCR’s ATM and other banking solutions, BCR agreed to approve the solutions for its members. These will improve operational efficiency, curb expenses and expand their business and at the same time ensure a superior self-service experience for the end customers.

Diego Navarrete, Vice President Europe for Financial Services at NCR, in a statement said that, “Cash management is costly and complicated, yet ATM services are essential for a positive customer experience.”

APTRA provides an open solution based on Microsoft Corp.’s (NASDAQ:MSFT) latest Windows OS, enabling the financial institution to offer self-service applications from different hosts while delivering these across hardware from multiple vendors. According to the press release, “The NCR APTRA Cash Management Suite enables us to automate forecasts and take the best action based on real-time information provided by the tool.”

The rapid development in technology has turned ATM kiosks into complete self-service terminals. We believe that NCR’s growth in ATM and self-service kiosk spaces is encouraging, given the tremendous growth prospects in these markets.

The company has been the global leader in self-service ATMs for several years in terms of market share. The company remains the largest supplier of ATM machines in Asia-Pacific and North America while maintaining its leadership in the Asian and European markets. Per the latest report by global research company RBR Research, the global installed base of ATMs is expected to reach 4 million units by 2020 from 3 million units at the end of 2014. Currently, India is the world’s fourth-largest ATM market with China, the U.S. and Japan holding the first three spots, respectively. This creates huge opportunities for companies like NCR.

We believe that the company’s commitment to protect the trust and integrity of the ATM channel has been inspiring banks and a host of other financial institutions to opt for its services.

Continued product launches, growing popularity of its self-service offerings and synergies from acquisitions are other growth drivers.

Softness in the ATM business in mature markets, competition from Diebold Inc. (NYSE:DBD) and HP Inc. (NYSE:HPQ) and a high debt burden remain concerns.

The stock has outperformed the Zacks categorized Computer-Integrated Systems industry in the past one year. NCR’s shares have returned 28.77%, compared with the industry’s decline of 1.99%.

Currently, NCR carries a Zacks Rank #2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank (Strong Buy) stocks here.

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