We have put up an exquisite panel, consisting of: Mr. Radu Gratian Ghetea (Chairman & CEO of CEC Bank and also Chairman of the Romanian Banking Association), Mr. Stefan Nanu (MEF General Director - State Treasury), Ms. Sheida Hadji Ashrafi (Worldwide Industry Manager Payments - Microsoft Corporation) and Mr. Sorin Guiman (CEO of Business Information Systems).

All the panel members have stated their opinion regarding the role the government institutions should play to provide a larger acceptance and adoption of SEPA provisions. The pilot solution we have innovated together with the Romanian Ministry of Economy and Finance was also on debate - qPayIntegrator over Microsoft® BizTalk® Accelerator for SWIFT.

Sorin Guiman, has written a post on swiftcommunity.net sumarising what the SIS, "Public Institutions in SEPA Context", was going to be all about. It goes as follows:

Seven months away Geoffroy de Schrevel posted his comment on SEPA going live without noticeable commitment of the public administration’s players. Now, Sibos in Vienna is hosting the Special Interest Session (SIS) on "Public Institutions in SEPA Context", scheduled to take place on Tuesday, 16 September, Lehar4 room. Geoffroy will moderate a panel including the CEO of the CEC Bank, the Deputy Minister of the Romanian Ministry of Economy and Finance (MEF), the Head of World Industry Payments, Industry Solutions from Microsoft Corporation, and the CEO of Business Information Systems (BIS). This SIS will emphasize the MEF daily payments and collections practice, by using its payment system - STEPS - provided by BIS. The two major anchors chosen by MEF, to ensure its interoperability with the European banking and business community, are the European Central Bank provisions on TARGET2 and the European Payment Council specifications for SEPA. MEF believes that its payment system might become a reference model for other EU State Treasuries. MA-CUG and SCORE are laying the ground for extending a higher quality distribution channel to enhanced financial services for corporate customers. Might the State Treasury take advantage of this business model?