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Our History

A History of Innovation

With nearly 60 years’ history of innovation, Cuscal has been at the forefront of championing competition in banking and regulated payments. We have expertise and capabilities across payments, data and the Consumer Data Right (CDR).

Cuscal has an established track record of adapting and responding to new market conditions and changing customer needs by harnessing the power of emerging technologies. Innovation sits at the core of our strategic initiatives and investments.

Timeline

1977 – Cuscal’s predecessor body launched Australia’s first ATM.

1983 – Cuscal was an early adopter of Visa scheme in Australia becoming a principal member of the Visa International Card system.

1992 – Established as the Credit Union Services Corporation Australia Limited.

2006 – Credit Union Services Corporation Australia Limited renamed as Cuscal Limited.

2009 – Launched the rediATM scheme to allow customers of smaller financial institutions to access a nationwide ATM network without any fees.

2014 – Launched Asia Pacific’s first HCE-based (Host Card Emulation) mobile payment capability, with Australia’s largest client-owned financial institution, CUA. Cuscal’s Chief Information Officer was the first person in Australia to perform a live HCE-based Visa payWave transaction using the new solution with the purchase of two packs of Tim Tams at a 7 Eleven in Sydney’s CBD.

2014 Acquired Strategic Payments Services Pty Ltd (SPS) in November, helping Cuscal reinforce its payments capabilities (particularly in merchant acquiring). The acquisition also diversified Cuscal’s shareholder base, with the addition of Bendigo and Adelaide Bank, and Mastercard as shareholders.

2016-2017 – Cuscal became the first ADI to launch connectivity solutions for all of the ‘Pays’- Apple Pay, Google PayTM and Samsung Pay – enabling our clients to be some of the first Australian financial institutions to offer their customers all three ‘Pays’.

2018 – Enabled more than 60% of the financial institutions that launched on Day 1 of the New Payments Platform (NPP).

2018 – Hosted inaugural Curious Thinkers, Cuscal’s marquee client conference focused on innovation, thought leadership and the future of payments.

2019 – Launched 86 400, a digital bank with an ADI licence.

2019 – Cuscal’s physical ATM assets and the rediATM Scheme was sold to the Armaguard Group.

2021 – Sold 86 400 to NAB, following NAB’s original minority stake in the business.

2020 – Launched our Customer Data Right (CDR) platform and enabled sharing of Product Reference Data for Open Banking clients.

2021 Data Holder compliance solution was introduced.

2022 – Developed New Payment Platform (NPP) PayTo services for Payer banks and third-party Initiators. Cuscal became the first certified NPP PayTo Payer and Initiator.

2022 Cuscal becomes an accredited data recipient.

2022 – Cuscal acquires myCDRdata from Regional Australia Bank.

2023 Acquired a material controlling interest in Basiq Pty Ltd (Basiq), a data and open banking API platform business, supporting Cuscal’s expansion into regulated data.

Google Pay is a trademark of Google LLC.
Apple Pay is a trademark of Apple Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries.
Samsung Pay is a trademark or registered trademark of Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.

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