Dun and Bradstreet net reporting here soon

By SIMON HENDERY

Competition within the transtasman credit services industry appears to be hotting up ... slowly.

Melbourne-based Dun and Bradstreet Australasia said last week that it expected to launch its previously announced Australasian internet-based consumer credit bureau within a month.

In May, the company said it would launch the service - to compete against the likes of Baycorp Advantage - by the end of July.

At least one analyst was bemused by D&B's claim last week that the venture would be "the first ever internet-based consumer credit bureau in Australia and New Zealand".

"We are unable to qualify this comment," UBS Warburg's David Roberton wrote in a research note, "as Baycorp has been offering a full suite of bureau products online in New Zealand and Australia since 1998 and 2001 respectively."

Responding to Roberton, D&B chief executive Christine Christian said her company would offer a range of new services.

"These are fairly sophisticated value-added services that allow the large credit providers to assess consumer credit risk in such a way that has never been available before."

However, D&B would not give details before the service was launched.

While Roberton also noted that D&B had not identified any credit information providers for the new service, Christian said: "We have already signed agreements with several of the large banks both here [in Australia] and across the Tasman, major retailers, telcos and large corporates, a lot of whom are already large existing D&B customers."

Baycorp Advantage has more than 14,000 subscribers to its internet-based business. Leading credit providers, who account for 85 per cent of Baycorp's inquiries, use the service via direct data links because the internet is not a practical means of access for high-volume inquirers.

Christian said the new service was a key component of D&B's growth strategy and part of its preparation for listing on the Australian Stock Exchange in 2004.

D&B's Australasian operations were bought out by senior management in August last year.

Global investment fund manager AMP Henderson owns 77.5 per cent of the company.