Visa eyes mobile payments market

VISA US chief executive John Philip Coghlan has announced a series of strategic partnerships with wireless technology companies, saying the mobile payments market was about to come of age.

Visa research had found that phone users were increasingly interested in the idea that their mobile device could be used for making payment transactions, Mr Coghlan said.

“Given the striking similarities in the paths our two industries have traveled, it is only natural we have arrived at a moment of convergence,” Mr Coghlan told the Cellular Telephone & Internet Association conference in Orlando.

“In fact, the convergence of payments and mobile communications is not just logical - it is inevitable.”

Visa recently announced its own mobile platform, a set of mobile services and enabling technologies that serve as flexible building blocks for the development of mobile payment solutions.

Mr Coghlan announced a strategic investment in dotMobi, a consortium of industry players pioneering the .mobi domain and is working on ways to enable mobile commerce into phones.

The company also announced an alliance and investment in Ecrio, which develops software for mobile phones on 3G networks. The company has software that lets barcode-enabled coupons and tickets be redeemed from mobile phones using existing point of sales equipment.

Mr Coghlan also said that VeriSign had announced it support the Visa mobile platform. Visa is also working with Qualcomm and Kyocera Wireless on integrating the Visa mobile platform in handsets.

Mr Coghlan said Visa research had found that four out of five consumers would prefer mobile purchases to pass through a credit or debit card network and appear on their card statement instead of appearing on their wireless bill.

Fifty-seven percent of consumers surveyed expressed interest in getting a phone with a payment application when shown what a payment-enabled phone might look like, and nearly 90 per cent of those who were interested in mobile payment said they would pay extra for a phone with this feature.

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Attache hits $10m winner

ATTACHE Software, one of the biggest names in the Australian small business accounting market in the 1980s and 90s will make a triumphant return to the spotlight at CeBIT Australia through its just-launched Attache 7 flagship package.

Developed over the past three years at a cost of $10 million – making it one of the biggest locally developed commercial software launches in years – Attache 7 is the platform’s first generational upgrade in a decade.

Attache managing director Michael Rich says the company has big expectations for the product, which he says hits the market “sweet spot” of SME customers that have outgrown products like MYOB and QuickBooks, but who aren’t big enough to afford the large-scale SQL-based financials.

The Attache 7 product is inexpensive – a typical implementation costing as little as $400 a month – and has retained its reputation for bullet-proof reliability that Attache has earned over its 26 year history.

Attache Software was present at the birth of the PC industry. The company was founded in 1981, and its Attache-branded software was the first PC application in the world to be distributed by IBM.

Mr Rich says despite its low profile in recent years, Attache has been the industry’s “quiet achiever”, with more customers, higher revenue and better profitability than at any time in its history.

The company also enjoys one of the highest customer loyalty and customer satisfaction ratings of any software company doing business in Australia. Though Attache 7 is the first major upgrade to the product in a decade, Mr Riche says there have been 26 point-release updates along the way – and customers like the platform.

Since it was launched late last year, the company has completed more than 1,500 Attache 7 installations, and hopes to compete 6,000 by mid-year. Mr Rich said the overwhelmingly positive reception for the product meant Attache Software revenues were expected to double in 2007.

Attache 7 consists of three components. The Accounts & Payroll software is strong in order processing, stock control, departmental reporting, with bomb-proof reliability, high-speed data entry, seamless integration with Microsoft Office and scalable to 100 users.

The second component is a ‘green’ document manager called Alex that lets users fax and email invoices and statements, pay advices – with batching and tracking – saving time, stationary and cash flow. The company says the Alex savings alone should cover the cost of the Attache 7 product.

The third component, Fast Track, is pay-as-you-go pricing that includes maintenance, the database and optional telephone and classroom support. The product is priced at a monthly amount that can be terminated with 60 days notice.

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SAP flies into Pilot Software acquisition

GERMAN software giant SAP has acquired fast-growing Pilot Software, a maker of analytical tools and strategy management systems designed to help senior management extract better information from finance and customer data.

The US-based Pilot’s analytical software aims to make it easier for high-level business managers to better align corporate strategic goals and corporate performance.

Founded in 2002, the privately-owned Pilot Software has more than 150 customers worldwide that use its strategy management tools across industries including financial services, the public sector and retail. Terms of the SAP buy-out were not disclosed.

By aligning strategy with execution, organisations are able to improve corporate performance, accelerate management decision-making, facilitate collaboration and turn information into value.

SAP described the acquisition as a “tuck-in” purchase, saying Pilot added “a critical piece” to its portfolio of analytic applications.

“Analytic applications that help organizations manage their performance effectively represent a strategic area of investment for SAP as we continue to expand our leadership in this market,” said SAP’s suite optimisation executive vice-president Doug Merritt.

Leveraging analytics to improve performance management has been among the top priorities of senior executives in the last five years and is an area in which SAP continues to broaden its portfolio and further strengthen its leadership position in the analytic applications market.

“With the acquisition of Pilot Software, we are providing an advanced system for defining and managing strategies that is integrated with the business processes of information workers,” Mr Merritt said.

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