Mobile operators mobilkom austria and ONE announced a significant milestone for the Austrian m-payment market with the presentation on October 5th, 2005, of the joint payment service paybox.
ONE will take over one-sixth of paybox austria AG, until now a 100% subsidiary of mobilkom austria. The successful mobile phone payment service will be operated and further expanded by both providers.
The close cooperation between A1 and ONE in mobile payment creates one of the first cross-company m-payment standards worldwide. That, in turn, creates considerable advantages for A1 and ONE customers as well as the Austrian retail market, and will give mobile phone payment in Austria a powerful boost.
The over two million A1 and ONE contract customers will in future be able to automatically use the m-commerce services of the respective other provider and make payments conveniently through their mobile phone bill. Prepaid customers, customers with company phones, and customers of all other network operators can use paybox - as always - via direct debiting from their bank account. Acceptance and possibilities for use also increases for all existing paybox customers. For example, it will soon be possible for A1 and ONE customers to pay for parking or a coca-cola from the vending machine through their mobile phone bill.
Hannes Ametsreiter, Director of Marketing, Distribution and Customer Services, mobilkom austria: "As technology leader, mobilkom austria became the first provider to take up m-commerce and, together with paybox, helped payment by mobile phone become accepted in Austria. The cooperative approach now taken by mobilkom austria and ONE is a logical step and will further expand Austria's international role as a pioneer in m-commerce. With one fell swoop, a technically unified payment system has been created, with which roughly two million customers can automatically make payments."
Jørgen Bang-Jensen, CEO, ONE: "Following our previous great successes with and the enormous degree of customer acceptance of payment via ONE service bill, our investment in paybox and the resulting interoperability with mobilkom austria allows us to considerably expand the application possibilities for our customers and our retail partners. The experiences gathered previously by mobilkom austria and ONE complement each other perfectly. Together we will further expand the Austrian market for payment by mobile phone and in paybox offer our customers a convenient, modern payment solution with numerous attractive opportunities for use."
Integration of the existing payment systems and the associated billing interfaces of both providers will begin immediately following approval by the European authorities under the leadership of paybox Chairman Jochen Punzet and director to be appointed by ONE.
Jochen Punzet: "paybox has contributed considerably to the popularity of mobile phone payment in Austria. paybox will in future serve as joint processor for interoperable mobile phone payments for A1 and ONE customers. 'paybox New' expands its customer base tenfold and thereby offers its accepting partners an especially low-risk investment. paybox, which enjoys a high level of trust among both customers and retailers, will be further promoted as a cross-company brand for mobile phone payments."
Depending on when approval is granted in the merger control proceeding, the first new joint offers are to be presented to the public in the second quarter of 2006. Until then there will be no changes to payment processes or technical connections to accounting systems for the existing customers and contract partners of all companies involved.
