Volante Technologies, the global leader in Payments as a Service (PaaS), today announced that Lakeside Bank, a leading community bank with over $2.64 billion in assets that specializes in serving mid-sized and larger businesses in Chicago, has selected Volante’s Payments as a Service (PaaS) to enhance its SWIFT messaging and implement end-to-end real-time payments via RTP® from The Clearing House and FedNow® from the Federal Reserve.

Selecting Volante as a strategic partner follows a period of rapid growth for Lakeside, which saw 16.5% net asset growth from 2022 to 2023. The Treasury Management division added a record number of new clients during this period, boosting Lakeside’s footprint as an innovator in an increasingly competitive landscape.

To build on this momentum, Lakeside started its payments modernization collaboration with Volante with SWIFT pre-processing to ensure ISO 20022 compliance for cross-border payments ahead of upcoming deadlines. The partnership is now focused on the deployment of real-time payments with RTP, marking a significant advancement in Lakeside’s ability to offer best-in-class real-time treasury services to its customers.

“Partnering with Volante is instrumental in leveling the playing field between Lakeside Bank and the world’s largest financial institutions as we seek to add new services such as real-time payments from RTP and FedNow. Volante’s Payments as a Service empowers us to offer faster, more efficient, and reliable services that rival those of the biggest banks,” said Matthew Palmisano, Senior Vice President and Director of Treasury Management at Lakeside Bank.

“Volante’s flexibility allows us to streamline our operations, reduce complexity, and rapidly deploy new payment products and features tailored to the specific needs of our clients. By leveraging Volante’s expertise in real-time payments and their robust API-driven architecture, we can offer the kind of innovative treasury management services that keep us competitive in a global market. Our regulators also look highly upon it as it enhances our ability to monitor and control payment activities with greater accuracy and transparency,” Palmisano said.

Lakeside Bank’s commercial clients are increasingly focused on optimizing cash flow, enhancing liquidity management, and mitigating risk. Lakeside has identified Volante as a treasury management services partner that helps the bank embrace new technology, expand its digital payment solutions, and offer customers more advanced real-time data analytics tools.

The introduction of real-time payments provides significant advantages. For instance, businesses handling large volumes of transactions, such as retailers and service providers, can benefit from the immediate availability of funds, improving cash flow and reducing the need for short-term financing. Additionally, businesses can execute transactions with greater speed, reducing settlement risks and enhancing client satisfaction.

“Volante gives us the tools to help our clients work more efficiently and save money, including those with extremely high transaction volumes, such as large commodity exchanges. This partnership enables Lakeside to provide our clients with world-class technology, reinforcing our commitment to delivering exceptional service and allowing us to effectively compete with banks of any size,” concluded Palmisano.

In prioritizing both cross-border payments and real-time payments, Lakeside is part of a broader global modernization movement. According to a recent survey by Volante in partnership with Finextra, over 90% of financial institutions plan to expand their real-time cross-border payment networks by 2025. Meanwhile, the U.S. is already processing over a million real-time payments every day with RTP from The Clearing House and FedNow instant payment networks live, and the global shift to ISO 20022 continues to transform payment infrastructures.

Lakeside joins a growing number of financial institutions that have adopted Volante’s PaaS to achieve their payments modernization goals, as evidenced by Volante’s recent recognition by IBS Intelligence as the best provider of wholesale payments systems in North America.

“At Volante, we are committed to empowering community banks like Lakeside to compete effectively with larger institutions by providing them with the same cutting-edge technology that powers seven of the top ten U.S. banks,” said Vijay Oddiraju, CEO, Volante Technologies. “Lakeside gains a strategic advantage by deploying our innovative payment solutions to modernize their infrastructure and enhance their service offerings.”

“After the successful enhancement of SWIFT processing, we are eager to help Lakeside move into the real-time payments domain, initially with RTP from The Clearing House. Volante is also committed to facilitating Lakeside’s expansion to FedNow in early 2025, among other payment types and services in the future,” concluded Oddiraju.