UK deal boost for EMS

By ADAM GIFFORD

Telecommunications applications developer EMS-global has signed a reseller agreement with British Telecom which will repackage and sell EMS' product under its own brand.

The New Zealand company's flagship product ECIS (Electronic Commerce Infrastructure Service) is licensed to Telecom and sold by esolutions under the name Safecom.

Esolutions general manager Sue McCarty said that last year Safecom accounted for $2.4 million of her company's $10 million turnover. Esolutions has about 60 customers using Safecom.

EMS-global founder and chief executive Waynne Dartnall would not reveal revenues or what his company expected to earn from the BT deal, but said BT intended to use ECIS as the basis for a move into internet security services.

ECIS is an internet protocol layer sitting on top of a telephone company network, into which different service modules can be plugged.

Dartnall said customers found technology such as firewalls, virus protection and intrusion detection expensive and difficult to maintain.

"ECIS puts the intelligence in the telco network which allows them to address the customer need, spreading the cost across multiple customers."

EMS-global developed ECIS in 2000, after recognising that its earlier focus on integrating enterprise management systems such as Tivoli, OpenView and Unicentre had limited growth prospects in New Zealand.

It established an office in Britain in November 2000. As well as selling products and professional services, the beachhead captured the attention of Europe's largest venture capital company, 3i.

Last June the London-listed 3i paid $17 million for a 35 per cent stake in EMS-global.

The company continues to develop ECIS modules.

EMS Global

3i