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Technology Stocks : CheckFree (CKFR) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: AugustWest who wrote (7083)	8/22/1998 12:40:00 PM
From: Benny Baga	Respond to of 8545

>>>Benny, you know how many drinks we'll have to have in honour of many of our postin cronies unable to attend? We only had on cancellation, and I had about 20 requests for the conf. call number from those who could not attend. I also think the weather will be decent, the storm should pass by the time we get down there.

To: AugustWest who wrote (7083)	8/22/1998 12:43:00 PM
From: R.Gluck	Respond to of 8545

>>>>Benny, do you know how many drinks.......Now that's something I can help with.....bg

To: AugustWest who wrote (7083)	8/24/1998 7:27:00 AM
From: Benny Baga	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 8545

Data Flow Key To Unlocking Door Between Online Bankers, VANs August 24, 1998 SUPPLY CHAIN REPORT -- Just as goods and materials must flow seamlessly, so too must payments. In fact, at no time is immediate remittance as important as now, given the growth of online purchasing. Coming to the rescue are Internet-based "home" banking networks, which make it possible for businesses and consumers to receive billing statements and send payments electronically. "We are anticipating it will be a great platform for business- to-business [electronic commerce]," says Bryce Hausmann, vice president for business development at Denver-based MSFDC, a joint venture of Microsoft Corp. [MSFT] of Redmond, Wash., and First Data Corp. [FDC] of Hackensack, N.J. "We're the first people who have entered into this small business market. The other guys doing business payments, like Sterling Commerce [SE] and Harbinger Corp. [HRBC], are clearly in the middle- to large-corporate market. Eventually, we would want to hook up with [them]," says Lynn Busing, CheckFree vice president. Providing a seamless data flow between value-added networks and home banking service providers could help push electronic data interchange down to the smallest links in supply chains. "The great thing and the tough thing about EDI is that it is so flexible there isn't really a common standard that works across ... businesses," Hausmann says. Consequently, costly EDI implementations rarely go beyond the big boys. MSFDC rival Integrion - the Philadelphia-based banking network owned by 18 financial institutions, IBM [IBM] of Armonk, N.Y. and San Francisco-based Visa - also is eyeing the business-to-business market. "There's no reason Integrion couldn't offer [EC] services to corporations and we are absolutely going to offer those services to small business," says Emily Mendell, Integrion manager for planning/communications . Integrion will introduce a small business product suite this year. Columbus, Ohio-based CheckFree Corp. [CKFR], which handles electronic payment processing and bill presentment for Integrion, has a subscriber base of 200,000, of which an estimated 5 percent to 10 percent are small businesses. Business-to-business transactions that require nothing more than a billing amount, account number and payer identification are indistinguishable from the electronic consumer payments that service providers like CheckFree offer today. Going forward, the challenge will be to expand the billing and remittance formats to accept detailed invoicing and variable payments adjusted for such things as discounts, spoilage and returns. "The basic infrastructure is the same and we certainly are keeping in mind some of the business-to-business needs, making sure the system is open enough to allow for enhancements when we want to develop that market," Hausmann says. Although the roll-out this year of both the MSFDC and Integrion home banking systems will focus on retail electronic bill presentment and payment, CheckFree already is positioning itself to be ready with a more sophisticated application for business-to-business invoicing and payments. CheckFree is developing electronic invoice presentment and related payment capabilities to facilitate "a biller that sends a lot of bills to the business community, especially small business," Busing says. For MSFDC, Integrion and CheckFree, the small business market (which includes firms with up to $10 million in revenues) is almost as attractive as the consumer market. Consumers make an estimated 15 billion recurring bill payments annually - for such things as utility bills and mortgage payments - according to analyst Gary R. Craft, with BancAmerica Robertson Stephens [BAC] in San Francisco. Craft puts the volume of business-to-business payments behind at 12 billion. And 60 percent involves small business transactions, Busing estimates. Shifting those transactions from paper to electronics offers a huge revenue opportunity for the networks and payment processors - which charge on a per transaction basis - and a savings opportunity for participating banks because as volume goes up, unit costs go down. [Copyright 1998, Phillips Publishing]