SEAGULL , the leading vendor of legacy evolution software solutions, announced on July 22nd that Ghana International Bank has selected SEAGULL's LegaSuite technology to deliver a complete online banking solution. Commercial customers worldwide will have access to comprehensive account administration and transaction capabilities through Ghana International Bank's e-banking solution.

Based in London, Ghana International Bank specializes in servicing the multi-currency commercial and personal banking needs of Ghanaians worldwide. Ghana International Bank was established in 1998 to take over the assets and liabilities of Ghana Commercial Bank Ltd in London. Its account portfolio of customers is split between both retail and corporate accounts the latter including major Ghanaian corporations, Banks and government agencies.

Using the Web-to-host component of LegaSuite, Ghana International Bank will create a secure, end-to-end online banking solution for both commercial and in due course personal lines of business based on the bank's back-office legacy applications. Customers will be able to execute all primary banking functions securely including account initiation, international funds transfer, standing orders, fixed deposits, statement inquiries, stopped checks, direct debits, address changes, and letters of credit via any Web browser. The system will give the banks customers a higher degree of flexibility in user privileges as well as providing a permanent audit trail.

"SEAGULL was the only vendor we considered that could meet our business requirements and deployment schedule economically," said Mervyn Harris, Senior Manager of IT and Electronic Banking for Ghana International Bank. "The transactional capabilities necessary for online banking were already in place in our existing legacy applications. LegaSuite provided us with a secure, high performance solution for extending our applications to a strategic Web environment as opposed to the cost, risk and complexity of creating a new application from scratch."

"Ghana International Bank is the international financial institution of choice for many indigenous banks, government agencies, commercial and individuals," added Harris. "Since our customers are spread throughout the world, online banking is an important, strategic counter-part to our traditional delivery channels as part of our mandate to provide consistently excellent customer service across geographic regions."

By the project's completion, more than 40 specific interactive banking functions will be accessible via the Web, resulting in greater convenience, efficiency and responsiveness for Ghana International Bank's global customer base. Traditional paper-driven services, such as letters of credit, will be replaced by online authorizations, reducing the processing and approval cycle significantly. The bank will gain a competitive advantage against other financial institutions in Ghana by combining sophisticated Web banking capabilities with first class, personalized customer service.

"Ghana International Bank's online banking solution exemplifies the power of leveraging legacy systems in new environments," said Kim Addington, senior vice president of marketing for SEAGULL. "By extending their core legacy applications, the bank is able to offer additional value to current customers and effectively introduce a new line of business to attract new customer accounts regardless of their geographic location. Total elapsed time for this project is less than three months - and the result is a scalable, high- function, secure online banking system that is based on a trusted legacy engine. Other approaches to meeting this business challenge just can't compare."

Deployment of Ghana World Internet Banking for commercial customers is scheduled to commence in Q4 2002. Retail banking is expected to be available during Q1 2003.

About SEAGULL

For 12 years, SEAGULL has been committed to a customer-centric approach to providing innovative, practical, ROI-based software technology for legacy access, extension, integration and migration to new architectures - we call this "legacy evolution". LegaSuite, SEAGULL's comprehensive suite of legacy evolution solutions, is in use in more than 7,500 Global 2000, mid-market and public sector organizations worldwide, and by over 1 million end users. More than 500 independent software vendors have incorporated LegaSuite products into their software solutions. SEAGULL has direct operations in the United States, the Netherlands, England, Ireland, France, Germany and Sweden, supplemented by distributors serving approximately 30 additional countries. For more information, visit http://www.seagullsw.com/.

Website: http://www.seagullsw.com/ http:///info@seagullsw.com