Office of Fair Trading refers the anticipated joint venture between LINK and TNS

The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) today referred the anticipated joint venture (JV) between LINK Interchange Network Limited (LINK) and Transaction Network Services (UK) Limited (TNS) to the Competition Commission. LINK and TNS are proposing to enter into a JV to provide various electronic financial transaction services to automated teller machine (ATM) deployers and card issuers in the UK. The services, that LINK (through its outsourcing division, ATMOS) and TNS each currently provide, would include ATM acquirer services, card issuer services and access gateways to national and international card schemes. Sir John Vickers, OFT Chairman, said: "The proposed joint venture would bring together the two principal suppliers of outsourced ATM transaction processing services. This might substantially lessen competition." Frontier (London) advises LINK on a number of aspects of its business.