<p>ARVADA, Colo. – SunCorp Corporate Credit Union went from not having a share draft processing business to processing nearly eight million items a month when it acquired Rocky Mountain Corporate. Now it will double its output with the acquisition of the Colorado CU System's share draft business. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. SunCorp is acquiring a share draft operation that processes nearly 8.5 million items a month for 122 credit unions in Colorado and Wyoming. SunCorp will take over the operation on March 1. When regulations divided the leagues and corporates, the share draft processing business went to either the league or the corporate. Many corporates kept the business because it was viewed as an extension of their role as payment processors, but there are still some leagues with solid share draft processing operations. "The advantage we bring is managing the settlement process. We do a really good job making sure that the Fed accounts that we keep all balance at the end of the day," said Eric Kenealy, president/CEO of SunCorp. "All corporates are building huge infrastructures to do payment processing. We can leverage that for item processing." Kenealy believes the corporate network is becoming a network of larger, regional corporates, all of which are players in item processing. With the acquisition of Rocky Mountain Corporate two years ago. SunCorp now serves CUs primarily in Colorado, Wyoming, Utah and Idaho. "We're kind of becoming a regional corporate. We serve a four-state region. If you look at what the other regional corporates are doing, they all have multiple item processing sites," said Kenealy. WesCorp, Southwest Corporate and Empire Corporate are a few of the corporates with multiple item processing sites. SunCorp will maintain its item processing facility in Salt Lake City and the former league operation will still operate out of the league's headquarters in Arvada. SunCorp will lease the space from the league and take on about 20 league employees who were dedicated to item processing. Kenealy said he is excited about the prospect of new check truncation technologies that SunCorp will be able to deliver cost-effectively by using its growing economies of scale. At 16 million items a month, SunCorp will now be one of the largest corporate item processors in the country. SunCorp will also now offer these 122 CUs deposit processing services, a service the league wasn't offering. Carroll Beach, president/CEO of the Colorado CU System, said the league could have continued successfully doing share draft processing, but this deal may bring new innovation to the league's members because of the economies of scale. Beach said that this by no means is a sign that the Colorado CU System is cutting down on its business lines. On the contrary, Beach said leagues and trade associations need the revenue from businesses to be successful in their public relations, legislative, regulatory and lobbying efforts. "Most successful trade associations have good businesses," said Beach. Colorado CU System EVP Jim Holt, who will take over for Beach in June, said SunCorp provided the league with an independent study showing CUs in Utah and Idaho were satisfied with the share draft processing services they were getting from SunCorp. "Leagues are all about helping credit unions deliver good products and services. Since they (SunCorp) were already doing it in Utah and Idaho, for them to serve one group and us another group seemed counterproductive." Kenealy said SunCorp does face a major decision right off the bat. The league's unit uses a Wausau system as its platform, while SunCorp uses AFS. Kenealy said SunCorp will not run two systems, but will convert one system over. It has not yet decided which platform that will be. [email protected]</p>