- Combined Company Will Offer Improved Payment Processing Services to Banks,
Credit Unions, Building Societies, Financial Institutions and Merchants With
Increased Economies of Scale -
DENVER, Dec. 22 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- First Data Corp. (NYSE: FDC), a
global leader in electronic commerce and payment services, today announced it
has signed and entered into a Merger Implementation Agreement to acquire
100 percent of the shares of Cashcard Australia Limited, a leading electronic
payments service provider in the Australian marketplace. The transaction
remains subject to Cashcard shareholder and regulatory approval. Financial
terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
"This transaction will allow for First Data's entry into the fast growing
Australian Merchant ATM deployment market and further demonstrates our
commitment to Australia and the wider Asia Pacific region," said Pam Patsley,
president of First Data International. "The combination of Cashcard and First
Data will provide a competitive payment transaction processing company for
both Australian financial institutions and retailers."
The acquisition also will create opportunities for First Data and Cashcard
clients, expanding the delivery of services such as credit and debit POS
processing, deployment of merchant ATMs, check authorization and money
transfers.
"Today's announcement is exciting as we believe this transaction will
offer a significant range of benefits to our many clients," commented Greg
Nash, managing director of First Data International Australia, New Zealand and
South Asia operations. "We believe the combined EFT switching and processing
lines of business will provide the scale necessary to ensure the merged
enterprise will remain cost effective, technology efficient and people-smart
in this rapidly changing marketplace, leading to the development of even more
competitive products and services."
Founded in 1983 by Australian Building Societies to build and operate a
shared ATM network, Cashcard now provides a range of services to other major
financial institutions and retailers, as well as operating a large Merchant
ATM acquiring network.
"We're pleased to be part of the First Data group, whose global expertise,
products and service offerings are highly regarded in the industry, providing
an unsurpassed level of service to the end consumer. We've collaborated on
many projects over the last 20 years," said Greg Baker, managing director of
Cashcard. "The combined organization should make for a more competitive EFT
processing industry and will allow First Data to participate more fully in the
merchant ATM deployment business."
The transaction is also subject to Australian Court approval and other
closing conditions. First Data anticipates closing the transaction in the
first quarter of 2004. Pacific Road Corporate Finance, Sydney is advising
First Data on the transaction. JPMorgan and Goldman Sachs JBWere are advising
Cashcard on the transaction.
About First Data
First Data Corp. (NYSE: FDC), with global headquarters in Denver, helps
power the global economy. As an electronic commerce and payment services
company, First Data serves approximately 3 million merchant locations,
1,400 card issuers and millions of consumers, making it easy, fast and secure
for people and businesses to buy goods and services using virtually any form
of payment. With 29,000 employees worldwide, the company provides credit,
debit, smart card and stored-value card issuing and merchant transaction
processing services; Internet commerce solutions; money transfer services;
money orders; and check processing and verification services throughout the
United States. First Data also offers a variety of payment services in the
United Kingdom, Australia, Canada, Japan, Mexico, Spain, the Netherlands, the
Middle East and Germany. Its Western Union and Orlandi Valuta money transfer
networks include approximately 169,000 Agent locations in more than
195 countries and territories. For more information, please visit
http://www.firstdata.com.
About Cashcard
Cashcard is one of Australia's premier payments services provider. It
provides high volume payment services across the entire consumer electronic
payments spectrum, including ATM and EFTPOS, Direct Entry and BPay, Telephone
and Internet payments. The group now services more than 50 member financial
institutions and several thousand merchants and has processed around
2.5 billion EFT payments since 1993, making it one of the largest independent
transaction providers in the region. For further details please visit
http://www.cashcard.com.au.
FDC-1
SOURCE First Data Corp.
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Related links:
http://www.firstdata.com
CONTACT:
Mary Walker of First Data Corp.,
+1-770-857-7188, mary.walker@firstdatacorp.com, or Jenny Miller
of First Data International - Australia office, +61-2-9959-7358,
jenny.miller@firstdata.com.au
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