VeriSign Inc. has agreed to acquire Seattle-based CallVision, an online analysis and electronic bill presentment and payment provider.
CallVision’s seven products, arranged in two product families – online billing and analytics, and rate plan optimization primarily for wireless carriers – will be folded into VeriSign’s intelligent commerce, content and communications (iC3) strategy for enabling commerce transactions for carriers and enterprises.
Through the acquisition, VeriSign will add converged electronic bill presentation, payment and customer self-care applications to its VeriSign Commerce Suite for mobile operators, Tier 1 carriers, broadband companies and consumer-brand MVNOs.
“This is a strategic fit,” said David Meredith, vice president at VeriSign. “More and more we’re seeing data and voice microcharging, and purchasing of goods with mobile devices, resulting in multiple relationships with service provider. We want to bring simplicity and the ability to manage the relationships.”
CallVision consolidates billing data from multiple systems, products, geographies, languages and currencies into a single electronic analysis and bill payment view, and creates one view of multiple accounts. The applications are offered to service providers as a managed service (hosted model), or on a licensed basis.
“We’re seeing the telcos adding new products quickly,” said Derek Edwards, president and CEO at CallVision. “Wireless companies are adding content and data, wireline providers are partnering, acquiring businesses and adding new services. It’s expensive to change the back end systems to accommodate that, so our systems can economically deliver easy-to-use solutions to help the end users feel like they’re working with one company.”
Providers can lower the total cost of ownership by using CallVision applications as a managed service to consolidate data from multiple sources, instead of having to do extensive integration on the back end.
Communications service providers also can offer CallVision’s e-self care, consolidated e-billing and billing analysis functionality to end users on a branded basis. For communications providers, the ease of use bolsters customer stickiness, lowers opex and reduces churn, the companies said.
“Carriers are offering many more solutions to their customers,” said Edwards. “Content, data and new applications are all coming across in their billing info, so it’s more complex for customers and call centers to manage. So the idea is to drive the customer into doing self-care.”
CallVision’s applications also help clients such as T-Mobile, Bell Canada, TelstraClear and AAPT (Australia) perform analytics on the billing data. These relationships will remain unchanged through the merger, the company said. CallVision distributes and markets its services through direct sales and channel partners such as global systems integrators and major BSS/OSS vendors.
“The acquisition of CallVision is a strategic investment that furthers our goal of providing intelligent infrastructure services that enable rich and seamless communications, commerce and content services for carriers, online portals, media companies and consumer brands worldwide,” said Vernon Irvin, executive vice president and general manager, VeriSign Communications Services.
The acquisition is being accounted for as a purchase transaction and is valued at $30 million net of acquired cash. Revenue and earnings contributions from the acquisition will not be material to VeriSign’s 2006 financial results. The transaction is expected to close in the first quarter of 2006. The CallVision executive team will join VeriSign.
VeriSign www.verisign.com
