By IANS,
Hyderabad : The city-based Tanla Solutions Ltd, with business interests in telecom infrastructure, Thursday announced its acquisition of Openbit OY, a $15.88 million Finnish mobile payment software provider.
Tanla has acquired 85 percent of Openbit at $18.60 million, having identified mobile payments as one of its core verticals.
Uday Reddy, CMD Tanla Solutions Ltd, told a news conference the transaction was an all-cash deal. The company would acquire the remaining 15 percent, held by Openbit’s current owners, in two tranches of 5 percent and 10 percent after the first and second year, respectively.
“Openbit gives us an opportunity to serve more customers in the international markets, and will help us become a global end-to-end applications and solutions provider,” said Reddy.
Juniper Research estimates the market opportunity to be in excess of $11 billion by 2011, a third of which would be on account of retail and ticketing segments.
Headquartered in Tampere, Finland, Openbit is recognized as a leading provider of solutions embedded in over 20 million handsets, including those manufactured by Nokia and Samsung.
It has global billing agreements that allow convenient payment of mobile content with nearly 90 operator networks in over 30 countries and with all major credit card companies worldwide.
Tanla, which has 500 employees here, is listed on both the National and Mumbai Stock Exchanges with a market capitalization exceeding $700 million for the financial year ending March 31, 2008. Tanla recorded revenues in excess of $119 million and net profit of more than $40 million.