We are excited to announce switstack moka, the first-ever developer-friendly ‘EMV development platform’ that simplifies EMV projects for teams building and launching card acceptance solutions for physical point of sale terminals or SoftPOS.
After 18 months of development, we offer the first release of switstack moka, a Platform-as-a-Service offering a ready-to-certify EMV stack, with the tooling needed to develop, compile, test, qualify, and maintain EMV payment acceptance solutions. We are offering a 90-day trial license that includes access to the source code and test automation suite.
Switstack was founded in 2023, by four industry veterans with deep experience in card acceptance at industry-leading organizations including Stripe, Clover, Amadis, Mastercard and Ingenico.
The EMV standard, which powers the 12 billion cards and wallets we use daily, is built on the principles of mutual authentication, risk management, and interoperability across payment networks. Every organization creating an EMV card acceptance solution—whether a physical point-of-sale terminal or a SoftPOS—must adhere to this global standard, which include constantly evolving kernel specifications and test plans. Creating an EMV card acceptance solution has traditionally been a long, costly, and resource-intensive process. Moreover, developing and maintaining an EMV Level 2 stack doesn't provide any competitive advantage for payment applications—it's simply a necessary requirement rather than a value-adding feature.
Expertise required: Working on EMV Level 2 requires deep technical expertise, significant investment, and rigorous monitoring with evolving specifications. External resources are scarce and teams can only access expert guidance through certification labs during certification or debugging sessions which happens late in the process and can contribute to jam queues.
Hardware dependencies and the rise of COTS (Commercial Off-The-Shelf): Historically, EMV Level 2 software was considered as a firmware running on a terminal. This perspective has shaped how the industry develops and certifies kernels. The assumption that an EMV Level 2 always resides on a payment device during its life cycle:
With the growing adoption of COTS (Commercial Off-The-Shelf) terminals and cloud-based architectures, these hardware dependencies in the EMV Level 2 stack have become an even greater obstacle to developing and testing payment applications.
Security Exposure: EMV Level 2 specifications only define a functional framework — they do not address broader security challenges like protecting sensitive data across the system architecture. This gap is particularly concerning in mobile and open device environments.
Teams building in-store payment solutions face two options for integrating EMV Level 2:
However, both approaches still require extensive in-house Level 2 expertise to maintain. They also rely on certification tools that are disconnected from the modern development process, creating inefficient debugging and endless testing feedback loops.
Moka enables teams developing payment acceptance solutions to easily integrate EMV Level 2 without requiring deep expertise or lengthy testing, debugging and pre-certification cycles.
switstack moka offers a Software Defined Approach to card processing, virtualizing all resources needed in the EMV Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) and automating actions to help developers create better EMV systems. This enables platform services abstraction (HAL), card/terminal virtualization, test tool emulation, EMV tests automation.
By implementing moka, teams can easily and reliably integrate EMV Level 2 while implementing best practices in security architecture and paving the way for flexibility and scalability required by modern payment solutions.
A full toolset for implementing EMV Level 2:
Built from the ground up, moka offers a comprehensive Level 2 stack that stays current with global standards and provides a complete toolkit with a "software-best-practices" approach that streamlines the development, testing, debugging and pre-certification cycles for teams:
Expertise Included: Always up to date with global standards
Switstack moka is always up to date with the technical specifications defined by EMVCo and payment networks, supporting both contact (CT) and contactless (CL) transactions. This enables payment application developers to focus on application development without requiring deep expertise in EMV Level 2 and rely on moka for lower level specifications and automated regression testing to flag any issues.
Improve Security in EMV Implementations
Securely managing sensitive payment data is crucial, especially in mobile acceptance scenarios where applications run in potentially vulnerable environments. Instead of distributing sensitive data processing across multiple components, Moka centralizes sensitive data handling, keeping it isolated and protected and offers simplified access control through well-defined APIs that enforce strict security policies. This approach reduces breach risks and simplifies PCI-PTS compliance, enabling secure implementations across mobile and open device environments.
The architecture also streamlines PCI-PTS compliance by providing clear separation between sensitive and non-sensitive operations. This separation makes it easier for development teams to implement and maintain compliant solutions while reducing the scope of security audits.
Enabling Cloud-Based Kernel Solutions
COTS devices have opened opportunities for cloud-based EMV Level 2 processing, decoupling Level 2 functionality from Level 1 certifications. switstack moka features a groundbreaking architecture designed from the ground up to support this centralized processing approach, delivering flexibility and scalability for modern payment applications
More Control and Flexibility
As more organizations strive to build innovative payment solutions with custom experiences for merchants and customers, they must develop their own payment solutions rather than rely on off the shelf products - which requires an EMV level 2 stack.
moka's source-available approach gives teams a modular, extensible codebase that adapts to project-specific requirements, reducing reliance on proprietary SDKs and vendor-specific tools.
How to get started with switstack moka:
Download the code, compile it, and run certification test cases for COTS and PCI-PTS platforms. We are offering a 90-day trial license for full access to the git account with EMV CI, full switstack moka framework with Entry Point, message broker and mastercard kernel.
Switstack moka is currently being implemented by a company specializing in public transit management solutions, delivering mobility, payment, ticketing, and fleet technology for transit agencies. They are utilizing Moka for the next generation of validator products, enabling payment card acceptance via Android COTS platforms. Moka was chosen for its modern architecture and integrated test automation tools, providing a cutting-edge solution for the company's needs.
The decision to choose Moka was driven by the team's proven track record in designing state-of-the-art EMV software ecosystems and their ability to deliver quickly. They wanted to improve their control on EMV technology, and to reduce the risks related to EMV level 2 certifications. With moka, they have a development environment that will allow them to perform continuous integration and deployments, while keeping compliance in check.
As a global leader in open payment transit solutions, the company deploys its products worldwide and required a solution that could meet international standards, with the expertise and capacity to support global requirements.
Switstack's was founded by four payment industry veterans with many years experience in the payment industry serving leadership roles at Stripe, Clover, Ingenico, Amadis and Mastercard. Our mission is to transform the in-store payment ecosystem by evolving payment solution development. We provide a comprehensive ecosystem that simplifies software teams' work, enhances code quality, and speeds up release cycles. Learn more about Switstack.