Singapore, 18th April 2002 - Mobile payments facilitator Systems@Work today launched TelePay at Singapore's largest shopping mall, Suntec City. TelePay is a unique mobile payment system that allows shoppers to pay for their purchases easily, securely and conveniently, with just their personal mobile phones.

TelePay is the result of the efforts of a consortium formed by Systems@Work, Gemplus Technologies, Mobile e-Services Bazaar of Hewlett-Packard (HP), VISA International and Suntec City. The consortium was presented the Award of Mobile Payment Solutions from the Infocomm Development Authority of Singapore (IDA) under the Call for Collaboration Initiative of its Wired With Wireless Programme in October 2001. Led by Systems@Work, the consortium's objective is to provide Singapore with a proven, robust, and easy-to-use mobile payments infrastructure for consumers, businesses and the government.

Said Mr Ng Fook Sun, CEO, Systems@Work, "Systems@Work is committed to help shape and create a mobile lifestyle. Together with our consortium partners, we are able to synergise best-of-breed solutions into a payment infrastructure that is robust and easy to use. This is an important step for the consortium towards providing a nation-wide mobile payments system for Singapore. This project also underscores the unique competitive offering of TeleMoney as a solution applicable to not just the Internet but also the wireless channels."

Using TelePay, shoppers no longer need to present card or cash at point of purchase. All they need is their personal mobile phone that acts as an authentication and authorisation device. TelePay is simple, convenient and secure to use. It links a person's mobile phone to his or her preferred payment method such as credit card, debit card, direct debit to bank account and subsequently stored value.

TelePay is designed to be a cost-efficient payment infrastructure for retailers, while providing greater convenience to their customers. It is estimated that retailers can save an estimated 60% of total annual terminal infrastructure costs. In addition to direct savings in infrastructure costs, both the retailers and customers now have an added convenience of accessing their transaction records online.

The system is easy to implement at low costs and causes minimal disruption to operations as participating merchants need only register with System@Work for a merchant account. Devices supporting multiple payment methods, such as the HP Jornada Pocket PC or the merchant's PC-based Point of Sales (POS) are linked to manage TelePay transactions. The HP Jornada's wireless capability makes it portable and enables payment settlement to be conducted anywhere inside or outside the shop. This brings added convenience to customers as well as merchants. With the friendly user interface, staff are able to learn how to operate TelePay easily.

Systems@Work is a member of HP's Mobile e-Services Bazaar, a dynamic marketplace of solutions and technologies for emerging mobile e-Services. Leveraging on HP's strength in providing infrastructure support for always-on mobile e-services, TelePay will be ported over to HP's Internet Operating Environment (HP development software and tools which comprises XML-based middleware products, wireless application and distributed transactions technologies). Together with the HP Application Server, and HP Jornada utilized as the merchant device, HP provides complete infrastructure support for the multi-mode payment solution.

"TelePay is a mobile e-service that will enable consumers and businesses to derive new value from the Internet and represents a significant step towards making the vision of a wireless future a reality for all," said Kelvin Tan, Director, Mobile E-Services Bazaar, Asia Pacific, Hewlett-Packard. "HP is committed to extending its infrastructure capabilities, information appliance leadership and mobile e-services expertise to help partners like Systems@Work in incubating and promoting innovative wireless applications for Singapore and the Asia Pacific region."

The system has been under intensive technical trials for the past three months. Today marks the start of the first phase, where the consortium is working closely with about 50 merchants in Suntec City. The next few months will see the consortium embarking on a whole series of marketing and promotional activities targeted to encourage consumer sign up and usage. The consortium feels that Suntec City is the ideal venue due to its huge size, wide merchant mix, and its management pro-technology approach.

Said Suntec City's CEO, Mr Wong Ah Long, "We are very pleased to work with our partners in providing TelePay. Suntec has over two million visitors every month. We are always happy to introduce solutions, technology-based or otherwise, that add value either to our tenants, or to their customers. We believe TelePay will be one such solution."

Suntec and Systems@Work also kickstarted the next phase of their partnership by signing an MOU to develop a non-queue wireless parking payments service for the complex's huge car park. Called TeleParking, the service enables visitors to Suntec City to pay for their parking fees via their mobile phones and possibly other mobile devices from anywhere within Suntec City. This service saves time and the hassle of having to look for and queue at Autopay Parking Systems. The service is expected to launched within the next 6 months.

Besides TelePay, customers can use the same TeleMoney number and PIN to make payments via other applications supported by TeleMoney over multiple channels including Internet, mobile and proximity (over-the-counter), such as TeleCab in CityCab taxis, online ordering for photo prints via FujiFilm's Print@Fujicolor or online payment of donations to the Rotary Club. For the complete list of shopping experiences accepting the TeleMoney Mobile Payments Solution, please log into www.telemoneyworld.com.




About Systems@Work
Systems@Work is a leading regional Universal Payments Facilitator offering pervasive, user-friendly services supported by a highly reliable and efficient infrastructure. It was incorporated in Singapore in 1999 with the vision to usher in a new era of secure and guaranteed e-commerce transactions to merchants and consumers.

The company's revolutionary product TeleMoney, is the only service available worldwide that provides consumers and businesses with a completely secure and convenient solution for online transactions using a GSM phone SIM card as the electronic I.D. to authorize online payments.




About CityCab
CityCab Pte Ltd is a member of the DelGro Group of Companies. It officially commenced business on 1 July 1995. CityCab currently has about 10,000 drivers operating a fleet of over 5,000 vehicles. This includes about 170 Presido taxis and 100 MaxiCabs using Mercedes Benz vehicles. It also operates the CityLink Direct Service.

CityCab has set new benchmarks for the taxi industry through its innovative products and services. These include being the first to introduce luxury taxi services, credit travelling and a computerised card payment system. It was also the first to launch a $20 million satellite-based computerised taxi despatch system known as CityNet.

In its journey towards achieving business excellence, CityCab was the first taxi operator in Singapore to receive the ISO 9002 certification in 1998. It also became a member of the prestigious Singapore Quality Class and attained the People Developer Standard Award by the Singapore Productivity and Standards Board in 1999. CityCab was also certified by the Customer Operations Performance Centre (COPC) Inc for its quality customer contact centre operations in 2000. In the same year, it launched Singapore's first Internet training platform for taxi drivers - COnSULT (CityCab Online - Skills Upgrading Through Lifelong Training) - to raise service standards of its drivers.

CityCab aims to be the preferred company providing personalised quality transport services to our customers worldwide.
 

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