Core treasury functionality is mature. Providers of treasuryworkstations are surviving, but innovation is occurring at themargins and in the delivery channel. ASP hosting never turned intothe down-market sales bonanza some predicted. Consolidation amongvendors continues. When demand for new functionality crops up,niche players often get there first. They could be eating the coresystems providers' lunches, except that the core providers areinviting niche players to lunch and forming the partnerships andinteroperability arrangements that both need to increase sales.Banks are finding new roles, more often as conduits of technologythan as inventors.

Sales of treasury workstations seem to be good but not great.Paul Bramwell, senior vice president for treasury solutions atSunGard AvantGard, insists that his company is enjoying growth inboth clients and revenue. “It's pretty buoyant,” he says. “Theprice of software is falling, but we see offsetting revenue growthfrom peripheral services like our SWIFT service bureau;corporate-to-bank connectivity services like our Echos and eBAMproducts; and through the increased demand for our hostingservices.”

But Bramwell concedes that the “enormous profits that wouldattract new players” are missing. “It is a good market but not ahot market with massive growth.” Hence there's been a continuingwave of consolidation as surviving players buy up smaller firms tobuild market share and operational scale.