Five European payment solutions have set up a jointly owned company to run the hub that will connect them. Bancomat, Bizum, EPI Company/Wero, SIBS–MB WAY, and Vipps MobilePay announced on September 30, 2026, the creation of the European Network for Payments (ENP), headquartered in Madrid. The company will operate the common interoperability hub that the five partners announced in a memorandum of understanding (MoU) signed in February.
The founders will be equal shareholders. ENP is to connect the existing solutions “through a common technical and operational layer based on European standards, including instant account-to-account payments,” the joint release says. The rollout is planned to start with cross-border peer-to-peer (P2P) payments, with e-commerce and point-of-sale (POS) payments to follow in later phases. The release gives no date for any phase and names no executive for ENP.
A company to run the hub promised in February
In February, the partners said the hub would be “operated by a future central entity jointly established by the partners.” That entity now exists. It will oversee technical coordination and the future expansion of both functionalities and participating solutions. Each solution keeps its brand and user experience, and the hub is to route transactions between them.
“Solutions and ENP are now preparing the technical implementation of the target set-up,” the release says. Fernando Rodríguez, Bizum’s deputy general manager for international expansion, said ENP had already selected a chief executive and was planning to recruit staff, Reuters reported. Neither the release nor Reuters names that executive. EPI chief executive Martina Weimert said shareholders will need to absorb operating costs in the early years, while the company builds the infrastructure and scale it needs to generate its own fees, according to the agency.
The February timetable is gone from the release
The February MoU came with a timetable. The central entity was to be set up in the first half of 2026, cross-border P2P payments were to roll out in 2026, and e-commerce and POS payments in 2027. ENP was announced at the end of September, after that first-half target. The September 30 release keeps the order of the phases but attaches no year to any of them.
Two publications still put a year on the network. Telecompaper reported on September 30 that the partners had confirmed it “will begin operating in 2027,” and the English edition of Il Sole 24 Ore wrote that ENP “will be operational from 2027.” Neither statement appears in the joint release published by EPI, Bancomat, Bizum, and KBC.
Cross-border transfers already run among three founders
Part of the P2P layer predates ENP. Within the EuroPA alliance, users of Bancomat, Bizum, and MB WAY have been able to send money to one another since March 2025. In February, Bizum managing director Ángel Nigorra said €6 million had been transferred cross-border during 2025 “without promotion.” ENP is meant to extend those links to Wero’s markets and to the four Nordic countries served by Vipps MobilePay.
The founders framed the venture as a matter of sovereignty. “Europeans should be able to use the payment solutions they already trust when they travel, shop or do business across borders,” Weimert said in the release. SIBS chief executive João Mello Franco said: “Interoperability is not just a technical achievement. It is a statement about Europe’s ability to shape its own payments future.” The copy posted by KBC, a Belgian bank that is an EPI shareholder, attributes Weimert’s statement to Mello Franco. This article follows the EPI and Bizum versions.
Open to newcomers, on the founders’ terms
The framework “may also accommodate other established European payment solutions over time, subject to the partners’ agreement and the technical and operational requirements of the network,” the release says. In February, the partners described the coalition as open to all European countries, including Switzerland and non-euro markets. Poland’s Blik and Greece’s IRIS, which EuroPA said in September 2025 had joined its initiative, are not among ENP’s founders.
Reuters framed the move as part of Europe’s effort to curb its dependence on Visa and Mastercard . The partners said the European Central Bank’s plans for a digital euro by 2029 could eventually complement their project, the agency reported. Reuters also quoted Marcel Hörauf, a partner at law firm Mayer Brown: “The creation of the European Network for Payments reflects a growing focus on connecting the payment systems Europeans already use, rather than replacing them.” Whether it translates into meaningful EU payment sovereignty depends on how Europe’s payment regulations develop, on merchant acceptance, and on political support from EU member states, he said.