Sun Microsystems and Grupo Acotel Help Caja Madrid Launch New Financial Messaging Strategy

Sun Microsystems, Inc. (NASDAQ:JAVA) and Grupo Acotel today announced that leading Spanish savings bank Caja Madrid is using the Sun Open Suite for SWIFT solution platform for its financial messaging strategy for the next three years, spanning Payments, Securities, Funds and Treasury, in addition to communication with external institutions including CNMV – the Spanish local market regulator.

Through this new strategy, Caja Madrid will be able to consolidate all bank-to-bank message flows, helping to improve efficiency and time to market in the design and execution of business processes, reinforcing Caja Madrid’s leadership position in new financial standards processing (SWIFT MX Messaging, SEPA Direct Debit and Target2 for Securities). This enables the savings bank to provide a new global value proposition for its customers, corporations and financial institutions.

This new initiative encompasses full SWIFTNet integration, creating a new development and execution platform for business processes related to Target2, EBA XCT and SCT, Iberclear (Spanish Local ACH), SWIFT Application to Application (ICM) Integration, SEPA Direct Debit Flows and TSU Value Supply Chain.

“Caja Madrid is helping its customers better manage their messaging infrastructure in a cost-effective way,” said Ambreesh Khanna, Global Head, Financial Services Industry, Sun Microsystems. “The Sun solution for SWIFT is ideal for any company wanting to improve the efficiency and profitability of its financial messaging operations.”

Sun Microsystems, as a strategic partner, is providing the Sun Open Suite for SWIFT solution, which is designed to kick-start SWIFTNet integration projects, and is made up of Sun's leading-edge SOA platform, Sun Java ™ Composite Application Platform Suite (Java CAPS), as well as hardware, operating systems and high-availability options dedicated to suit the particular needs of SWIFT participants. SWIFT recently awarded Sun Java CAPS the SWIFTReady Label in the category of Financial Enterprise Application Integration (EAI) for the 10th consecutive year.

Grupo Acotel is the implementation partner for Caja Madrid on this project and has long-term experience implementing SWIFT solutions, and the vertical modules developed on top of Java CAPS. Grupo Acotel has been providing business solutions and services in the SWIFT World for over six years, it is a SWIFT Certified Service Partner and SWIFT Certified Solution Partner.

The savings bank Caja Madrid (officially Caja de Ahorros y Monte de Piedad de Madrid) provides services at approximately 2,000 banking offices and more than 4,600 supermarket locations throughout Spain offering retail, business, and private banking services to over 7 million individual, small business, corporate, and institutional customers.

About Sun Microsystems, Inc.

Sun Microsystems develops the technologies that power the global marketplace. Guided by a singular vision -- "The Network Is The Computer™" -- Sun drives network participation through shared innovation, community development and open source leadership. Sun can be found in more than 100 countries and on the Web at www.sun.com.

About Grupo Acotel

Grupo ACOTEL is made up of several highly specialized IT companies (Communication Management, IT Management, System Engineering and Software Delivery). Besides SWIFT Service Bureau, SWIFT brings ACOTEL the opportunity to provide a handful of services to Companies and Financial Institutions: deployment, integration, development and operation support related to their SWIFTNet connection. ACOTEL has become the preferred solution integrator in specific areas: Payments, Reconciliation, Anti Money Laundering, Treasury for the Spanish and LATAM markets. www.acotelsa.com

Sun, Sun Microsystems, the Sun logo, and Java are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. Acotelsa, Grupo ACOTEL and Red Financiera are trademarks or registered trademarks of Grupo Acotel.