NEW YORK-Paris-based Telemedia.fr has positioned itself to help telecommunications and Internet content providers capitalize on the convenience sought by French consumers, who prefer dialing to surfing for information on their landline and wireless phones.
“We offer a response to the problem all these companies are having with the Internet, that is, how to make money off of it,” Pierre Guillermo, president and chief executive officer, said last week at the New York Society of Security Analysts “Euroland Equity Forum.”
“We are an aggregator and a content provider, and we relieve consumers of the inconvenience of surfing the Web.”
Established in 1985, Telemedia launched its dial-up services over France Telecom’s Audiotel network a year after receiving federal regulatory approval for its invoice system. France Telecom divides the revenue with Telemedia from each call received from wireline and wireless phones to 66 different phone numbers with the “08” prefix. The company provides information and interactive services, including stock quotes, horse races, banking, mail order requests and games.
The company handled 8 million calls last year and expects that number to more than triple this year to at least 25 million.
“Mobile users are greater consumers of our services than wireline users,” said Ralph Goodridge, vice president of international relations.
At the end of last year, there were 34.1 million wireline customers and 29.7 million wireless customers in France. The number of mobile subscribers in the country increased by 9 million during 2000.
“Until now, the cost of each call has been limited to 30 cents. But now ART, L’Agence de Regulation des Telecommunications, has defined seven levels so we can bill as much as $4 for specialized information, like research provided by people (in response to caller queries),” Goodridge said.
Under a market deregulation allocation from ART that becomes effective July 1, Telemedia will control, 140,000 of the 420,000 “08” numbers in France. Instead of splitting its revenues with France Telecom, Telemedia will have to pay a much smaller amount per toll call for network rental.
“In the last half of 2001, we will start handling our own calls as a telecom operator,” Goodridge said.
“But Telemedia is not a network operator, so we have no costs associated with that infrastructure or UMTS licenses. We receive calls, direct them to our own servers and host the information of third parties, like the media, banks and insurance companies.”
Today, Telemedia’s system offers voice-to-voice, voice-to-text and text-to-voice retrieval, Guillermo said.
The company can provide text messages to WAP-enabled wireless phones and will soon be able to do so via GPRS and EDGE technologies for 2.5-generation wireless. In 2003, the UMTS third-generation wireless protocol will enable Telemedia to provide a combination of voice, text, picture and video offerings to its services.
The company is in an enviable position financially since it does not have any outstanding debt. In March, it was able to raise $13.23 million during a secondary stock offering, although the total was below its goal of $17.64 million. Proceeds will enable it to pursue expansion goals.
“Our external growth plan is to buy out companies that have developed online information content and have earned profits,” Guillermo said.
The chief executive, who also founded the company, now owns 69 percent of its outstanding shares, while the remainder are publicly traded.
Last July, Telemedia went public on the Marche Libre, France’s equivalent of the Over the Counter market. As of April 9, the stock was valued at $51.17 per share, well above its initial offering price of $17.11 but below its peak of $79.49.
By mid-year, Telemedia hopes to receive approval to list its stock on the Nouveau Marche, the Nasdaq of France.
