PAYNOVA ESTABLISHES FRENCH SUBSIDIARY
Paynova AB has formed a wholly-owned subsidiary, Paynova France EURL, to handle the growing interest in the company’s secure payment solutions from the French online retail community. To date, agreements have been signed with 12 French online retail companies and negotiations are ongoing with a further 50 or so. Establishing the company in France means that Paynova’s transaction costs for online trading will be manifestly lower.
“We have got off to a flying start in France through the fact that the right person was working at one of our partners, and he saw the possibilities for us and got in touch,” says CEO Pelle Hjortblad. “We began around the beginning of the year, and have now managed to gain some extremely interesting customer contacts to work with. The French market is often regarded as difficult, so it is particularly satisfying to feel that we have been successful in establishing Paynova on the third biggest online retail market in Europe.”
The business is headed by Abdallah Hitti, who has extensive experience of both the Internet and online trading, and the financial market. A comprehensive network has been put together including well-established payment-processing companies, banks and credit card companies. This infrastructure means that online retail companies can now be offered extremely low transaction costs with the highest level of security and customised service levels. Thanks to Abdallah Hitti’s commitment and contacts, establishment and operating costs will also be low enough to be well within the framework of Paynova’s existing budget.
“I have got to know Paynova since September last year, and see huge potential for Paynova’s payment solution on the French market,” says Abdallah Hitti. “As manager of Paynova France, I will be the one to cultivate close contacts with the leading banks and help e-retailers here to increase their turnover and market presence by means of the Paynova Wallet. Management of the wallet itself is not affected by this establishment but will continue to be managed as before by Paynova in Stockholm.
Abdallah Hitti, 53 years of age, is an engineer and e-retail expert with 14 years’ experience of online financial services. For the last two years he has been working for NTSys, whose secure payment platforms handle 2 million euro per month. In 1995 he started the launching company Hi-Comm, and has since then worked as a consultant for numerous companies. He is also a member of several e-retail institutions, including the American Banker Association, BITS (US online banks), the Electronic Business Group and GII (US e-retail platform).
For further information. please contact:
Pelle Hjortblad, CEO Paynova AB
Cell: +46 (0)701-810 110 Phone: +46 (0)8-517 100 07
Email: pelle.hjortblad@paynova.com
Mats Jonnerhag, PR and information, Paynova AB
Cell: +46 (0) 708-754 920
Email: mats.jonnerhag@paynova.com
Abdallah Hitti, Paynova France EURL
Cell: +33 6 0918 3909
Email: abdallah.hitti@paynova.com
About Paynova
Paynova AB, listed on NGM Equity on 26 February 2004, is a company specialising in secure online payments. The Paynova Wallet is a digital wallet for digital transactions that can handle amounts from 5 pence and up. The digital wallet enables the customer to manage and control purchases limiting his/her personal credit card or eBanking information to only one counterpart. The Paynova Wallet is easy to acquire and use, and simple for the merchant to install. More than 20 000 banks worldwide accept the Paynova solution for VISA and MasterCard payments. Since its launch in 2001, Paynova AB has signed agreements with more than 500 companies and organisations that now offer the Paynova Wallet as a payment option on their websites. Pelle Hjortblad is the CEO of Paynova. The full Paynova share prospectus can be found at www.paynova.com