Uzbekistan’s Octobank presented its model for a unified payment infrastructure at the international forum Fusion Georgia 2026: Banking & Retail Solutions, held on October 8 in Tbilisi. The bank’s view is that a competitive edge now comes from how smoothly technologies work together, not from adopting them.
The forum was organized by BS/2, part of the Penki Kontinentai group. It brought together 325 professionals from 164 organizations, including 43 banks, 93 retailers and 28 technology companies and vendors. Participants discussed digital payments, automation of banking processes, artificial intelligence and acquiring: the things that now connect the bank, the merchant and the end customer.
For banks in the CIS, this is now a practical task. Cashless payments, e-commerce and remote banking keep growing. That forces banks to rebuild infrastructure that was put together piece by piece for years. ATM networks, processing and mobile services grew separately, each with its own logic. Today, a bank’s efficiency depends on how well these parts work together.
This was the focus of a presentation by Asatilla Nurmatullaev, Director of the Processing Department at Octobank, titled “From ATMs to Digital Payments: Building a Unified Payment Infrastructure for a Modern Bank.” He described how the bank brings processing, ATMs and digital payment services together. He argued that processing is no longer just the technical handling of transactions. It now links payment channels, banking products and external services. When processing is integrated with the ATM network, acquiring and digital platforms, the bank’s systems stop being fragmented, and it gains a foundation for scaling.
“The future of the banking industry lies not in the number of technologies implemented, but in how effectively they are combined into a single ecosystem. Our experience at Octobank shows that when processing, ATMs and digital payments work as a single whole, technology stops being merely infrastructure and becomes a driver of business growth,” said Asatilla Nurmatullaev.
The approach has three practical effects. The bank’s infrastructure is easier to manage and depends less on scattered systems. Customers get the same convenient service in every channel: at an ATM, in a mobile app or at a payment terminal. Businesses can build banking tools into their retail and service operations. ATMs deserve a separate mention. Mobile banking has not pushed them out. Instead, they are becoming part of the bank’s shared platform, and they now do more than handle cash. This matters most in markets where digitalization is happening at the same time as traditional infrastructure is being modernized.
Octobank’s participation also shows that Uzbek banks are taking a growing part in the international technology dialogue. Digital services in the country are expanding fast, and customers expect quicker, more convenient transactions. That makes the bank’s experience of integrating processing, acquiring and remote channels useful to its neighbors as well. Many CIS banks face the same task: they need infrastructure that can take on new payment services and partner solutions without rebuilding core processes each time.
On the sidelines of the forum, the Octobank delegation met with representatives of international banks and technology companies. They talked about processing and acquiring, partner service integration and new self-service features. They also covered the practical side of implementation: compatibility, scalability, information security and the resilience of payment operations. Payment infrastructure is now built jointly by banks, software developers, hardware manufacturers, payment providers and retailers, so contacts like these have direct practical value for banks.
The key takeaway from the Tbilisi discussion is that a bank’s digital transformation is no longer a set of separate IT projects. It is the steady development of a single technology foundation. Octobank plans to keep improving its payment infrastructure and building partnerships, and it treats technology integration as part of its long-term strategy
