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From Yahoo News
Thursday May 21, 8:57 am Eastern Time
Company Press Release
Year 2000 Compliance Nets Columbia Capital Corp. Two New Contracts
FT. LAUDERDALE, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 21, 1998--COLUMBIA CAPITAL CORP. (NASDAQ:
BB-CLCK) reported today, the execution of two agreements which are expected to result in revenues of $1,250,000 for the fiscal year ended on December 31, 1998 and $2,500,000 for each of the fiscal years 1999 and 2000. These agreements are with Peak Card Management, Sioux Falls, SD, a new customer, and BestBank, Boulder, CO, an existing customer. Both contracts are for processing services.
Ken Klotz, President of the Columbia Capital Corp. stated, ''The Company's wholly-owned subsidiary, First Independent Computers, continues to make great strides in increasing the number of accounts that it is servicing.'' Mr. Klotz further stated that he believed that the increases in number of accounts and new processing customers are due to the fact that First Independent Computers has already addressed the Year 2000 problems, that many of its present and prospective customers are facing. He went on to say that First Independent's customers, primarily banks and other financial institutions, are facing mandates from various regulatory agencies to show that they are prepared for the possible problems that may occur due to the Year 2000 issue, without causing any interruption in business. According to Mr. Klotz, ''The fact that Columbia Capital has already addressed this problem and offers a solution to prospective customers, offers us a significant marketing opportunity and we intend to capitalize on it.''
The agreement with Peak Card Management is for processing of credit cards, debit cards and merchant processing services.
Most of the revenue to be received by the Company, in connection with the two agreements, will be derived from the Peak Agreement. Greg Ticknor, President of Peak, stated, ''Peak will be marketing programs for several banks and financial institutions. We chose First Independent to provide processing services, because of their attention to detail, responsive attitude and their state-of-the-art Year 2000-compliant processing software.'' Mr. Ticknor went on to say that, as a relatively new company, Peak couldn't ''take a chance with a processor that was not Year 2000 compliant and hope that there
wouldn't be problems.''
The second agreement, with BestBank of Boulder, Colorado, an existing customer of the Company for its credit card programs, is for all of the bank's other data processing, including general ledger, checking and savings accounts and loans. T.Alan Boyd, President of BestBank stated, ''We are switching to First Independent because our current provider is not yet Year 2000 compliant. First Independent's Year 2000-compliant software, has made it possible for us to solve this problem, before the mandated deadlines from the various regulatory agencies. With all of the uncertainties surrounding the Year 2000
issue, we couldn't afford to wait to find out whether or not our current processor's software could be made Year 2000 compliant.''
Columbia Capital Corp. operates through its wholly-owned subsidiary, First Independent Computers, Inc., which is a multi-faceted information service organization. The services provided by the Company include credit and debit card processing, bank and financial services processing and document management and distribution services. The Company concentrates on a niche market, consisting of small to medium-sized financial institutions, that have not achieved the
economies of scale to operate their own in-house programs and systems.
Contact:
Columbia Capital Corp.
Charles LaMontagne, 915/674-3100
Chief Financial Officer
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