What may prove to be a big change in the local payments industry went little noticed in July, when the US payments processing and technology company Fidelity Information Services acquired rival payments processing company Worldpay for US$43 billion.FIS may not be a household name but it has been in Australia since the 1980s, first as a supplier of core banking systems and more recently payment switching services.The company's product development executive for international markets, Anita LeMaire, says Worldpay has a much bigger brand presence and the acquisition will raise the group's profile and its business activities here.Since the early 2000s FIS has operated an Australian centre providing outsourced debit and credit processing for the region. It currently manages 11 million Australian and regional card accounts.More recently it has moved into enterprise payments.Currently, the company is working with clients on their adoption of the New Payments Platform, particularly improving the performance of their data centres. "There is a lot of systems change involved in this. People underestimate the amount of work needed to adapt," LeMaire says.FIS has relationships with all the big Australian banks and most of the mid-tier banks.She says the company expects to be involved in Open Banking projects. "We have some experience in that area in other markets. It causes a lot of anxiety because of data protection concerns, such as what you can access and what you can't."While FIS is big in the issuing side of the card payments business, WorldPay is involved in the acquiring side in 146 countries.The two businesses also offer data analytics, risk management and fraud prevention services.WorldPay is relatively small in acquiring in Australia. It is a big acquirer in the airline industry, where it has a global presence.One of the group's selling points it that it can provide a full range of payment services for companies that operate locally and overseas. Its market is global acquisition."The big local banks do very little in that area," LeMaire says.She says e-commerce will drive growth in demand for global payment services. "There are plenty of local e-commerce companies that want to move outside Australia and plenty of overseas companies that want to come here."The e-commerce industry is demanding real-time data analytics. When online retailers have flash sales the traffic volume goes up very quickly. You need to be monitoring that and be able to match it with payment processing resources."