B: BellSouth Wireless Data Unveils Broad Plan to Provide E-commerce On-The-Go
NEW ORLEANS, Sep 22, 1999 (BUSINESS WIRE) --
(COMTEX)
Strategy Will Lead to Secure Financial, Healthcare, and Personal
Banking And Shopping Applications for Wirelessly Enabled Handheld
Devices
BellSouth Wireless Data is preparing to offer a wide-ranging
portfolio of secure wireless e-commerce offerings beginning by the end
of 1999 under a comprehensive strategy that it unveiled today during
the PCS '99 show. BellSouth Wireless Data also announced several
companies that it is working with to develop wireless e-commerce
infrastructure and applications enabled for the BellSouth Intelligent
Wireless Network(SM).
"E-commerce is virtually exploding across the Internet and wireless
will play a large role in this incredible growth area," noted Janet
Boudris, senior vice president, Strategic Marketing for BellSouth
Wireless Data. "As our society becomes increasingly more mobile many
people who buy goods and services via their computers also will want
the same flexibility, freedom and control to easily and securely make
purchases when they are on the go as well.
"BellSouth Wireless Data is well positioned to meet the demands of this
mobile marketplace," Boudris said. "Our powerful, highly reliable and
interactive Intelligent Wireless Network today can accurately and
quickly deliver nationwide the critical information that consumers and
service providers alike need to execute a wide range of transactions."
Fidelity(R) Investments' wireless enablement last January of its
InstantBroker(SM) personalized financial information and trading
service via the Intelligent Wireless Network and RIM Inter@ctive(TM)
Pager 950 was the first step in BellSouth Wireless Data's wireless
e-commerce plan. BellSouth Wireless Data also has numbers of other
initiatives in its plan, including adding infrastructure to its network
that will allow other wireless e-commerce offerings to be deployed, and
for the development of applications in such markets as finance,
healthcare, personal banking and mobile shopping.
BellSouth Wireless Data is working with several companies to execute
its wireless e-commerce plan, including Diversinet Corporation, First
Call Corp. - a Thomson Financial company, and eButler.com.
Diversinet Corporation, a Toronto-based company, develops products
based on public key infrastructure (PKI) and digital certificate
technology. Diversinet's technology is capable of providing BellSouth
Wireless Data subscribers with digital, electronic "signatures" that
will verify their identities so that they can securely access personal
and confidential information, purchase goods and services, write
prescriptions and the like wirelessly using compact, handheld devices.
BellSouth Wireless Data and Diversinet will begin testing the PKI
technology in conjunction with the BellSouth Intelligent Wireless
Network in October using a financial application from Boston-based
First Call Corp., the global financial community's leading source of
real-time broker-sourced research, earnings estimates, equity and fixed
income ownership information, insider trading information, and
corporate news releases. The First Call application will be used by
select financial analysts to have confidential quote and rating
information regarding companies they are tracking delivered wirelessly
to the RIM Inter@ctive Pager 950.
BellSouth Wireless Data and Diversinet are also evaluating
opportunities in the healthcare environment and are in active
discussions with a national medical company to market wireless
e-commerce solutions to the medical community. Among the solutions to
be developed will be the ability of doctors to wirelessly transmit
prescriptions to pharmacies even when they are on the road at a
conference or traveling to and from the hospital.
BellSouth Wireless Data is also working with other partners to explore
broader opportunities in the world of wireless e-commerce. The company
is working with a major financial institution to build a personal
banking application enabled for the BellSouth Intelligent Wireless
Network. BellSouth Wireless Data also is partnering with Holmdel-N.J.
based eButler.com, a subsidiary of Instanetics, which is developing an
application that will allow users to order and pay for groceries, all
from the RIM Inter@ctive Pager 950. This type of offering is one that
will be used by consumers only when circumstances don't permit them to
shop in person and, therefore, will be bundled in the future with other
similar convenience applications.
"The potential is huge and the applications are seemingly endless,"
Boudris said. "Forrester Research projects that U.S. business to
consumer e-commerce sales will increase to $18.1 billion in 1999 from
$7.8 billion just a year ago. Business-to-business sales will jump from
$43 billion in 1998 to $109 billion this year. And the numbers will
just keep growing as innovators and entrepreneurs devise more ways to
conduct business in an Internet setting."
BellSouth Wireless Data, L.P., headquartered in Woodbridge, N.J., is an
expert in providing proven wireless data communications solutions that
eliminate the barriers between critical information and mobile users.
The company, a winner of the prestigious Sears Innovation Source of the
Year and Partners in Progress awards, delivers a competitive advantage
and increases personal productivity for aggressive, innovative
companies and individuals leveraging communications technologies to
meet their strategic goals. BellSouth Wireless Data operates its
wireless data service throughout the United States, covering more than
93 percent of the urban business population located in 492 Metropolitan
Statistical Areas (MSAs) and non-MSAs with a total population of 200
million people.
BellSouth Wireless Data is a subsidiary of BellSouth Corporation.
BellSouth Corporation provides telecommunications, wireless
communications, cable and digital TV, directory advertising and
publishing, and Internet and data services to nearly 34 million
customers in 19 countries worldwide. E-mail:
Bellsouthwd.info@bellsouthwd.com. Web site address:
www.bellsouthwd.com.
Copyright (C) 1999 Business Wire. All rights reserved.
Distributed via COMTEX.
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CONTACT: HWH Public Relations for BellSouth Wireless Data
Russell Rowland or Chris Loncto
(212) 355-5049
russr@hwhpr.com/chrisl@hwhpr.com
WEB PAGE: businesswire.com
GEOGRAPHY: NEW JERSEY LOUISIANA
INDUSTRY CODE: TELECOMMUNICATIONS
COMPUTERS/ELECTRONICS
COMED
INTERACTIVE/MULTIMEDIA/INTERNET
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