CAPITAL ONE A STRATEGIC IT MODEL

At the Capital One Financial Corporation, one of the largest providers of Mastercard and Visa credit cards in the world, information technology is completely intertwined with the business and has been since the company's founders embarked on a mission to market credit cards to different types of customers just over a decade ago. Based in Falls Church, Virginia, Capital One is a financial services company that employs an information‐based strategy to target and secure customers. By using proprietary integrated systems to manage large volumes of data, the company continually tests new product offerings and pricing combinations on an array of products, including numerous Platinum and Gold credit cards as well as secured and customised credit cards for consumers with limited credit history. As of June 1998, Capital One had more than 13.5 million customers, $15 billion in managed loans and information on approximately 120 million households in the US, Canada and the UK.