Redknee Enters One of the World's Fastest Growing Mobile Markets
Redknee Wins Contract to Deliver Converged Billing and Customer Care Solutions for Smart Telecom in Nepal
TORONTO – September 29, 2009 – Redknee (TSX: RKN), a leading provider of business-critical software and solutions for communications service providers, is pleased to announce that it has been selected by Smart Telecom of Nepal for its converged billing and customer care software solutions, and for its expertise in supporting high-growth network operators. Smart Telecom is rolling out both wireless and satellite services as it enters one of the fastest growing mobile markets in the world. Nepal’s teledensity rate was only 6 percent in 2006 and has grown to 23% percent today, however more than 80 percent of the population lives in rural and difficult geographic terrain, with no or limited access to telecommunications services.
Subhas Bajracharya , CEO, Smart Telecom comments:
“The challenge of providing service to a geographically dispersed market and the desire to meet the needs of underserved rural populations meant that we needed a partner who was an expert in supporting operators in high growth markets. Redknee’s expertise and best-in-class solutions give us the confidence that we will be the operator to finally bring a competitive wireless offering to the people of Nepal.”
Redknee’s Turnkey Converged Billing solution will provide Smart Telecom with the ability to launch voice, messaging and data services to its prepaid and postpaid customers over both GSM and satellite networks. With Redknee’s Turnkey Converged Billing (TCB), Smart Telecom will be able to streamline system deployment and reduce costs and time-to-market, while delivering an unparalleled service experience to its subscribers. Redknee will also provide full interconnect billing support through its InBill solution, which will enable Smart Telecom to have greater visibility into its networks’ transactions, allowing them to achieve converged settlement and accurate interconnect billing.
Smart Telecom has also acknowledged that while providing the infrastructure is the first step to improving telecommunications in the region, encouraging adoption will be contingent on providing targeted service offerings and a high quality customer experience. Smart Telecom will leverage Redknee’s Turnkey Converged Billing mobile self care capabilities, as well as deploy Redknee’s Airtime Reseller solution to enable voucherless airtime top-ups. By providing a convenient way for customers in all regions to top-up their account, Redknee’s Airtime Reseller will enable Smart Telecom to establish a network of voucherless minute-to-minute ‘resellers’, reducing the need to build and support retail branches.
Billy Liew, Redknee’s VP APAC Region comments:
“This is another strategic customer win for Redknee, as we continue to gain market share in the real-time converged billing space. The selection of Redknee’s complete end-to-end solution by Smart Telecom reinforces our leadership in this space, and we are excited to support Smart Telecom’s success in one of the fastest growing mobile markets - Nepal.”
Redknee’s Turnkey Converged Billing is an end-to-end real-time convergent billing solution that provides operators the ability to manage any service across any access technology, and supports all payment types with a single data model approach. TCB’s unified real-time architecture reduces complexity and time to market for launching new services. From activation and provisioning, to real time rating, billing, invoicing, partner management, mobile money services, interconnect, roaming and full customer care, TCB expertly addresses the needs of network operators throughout the world’s high growth markets.
For more information on Redknee’s products and solutions, please visit www.redknee.com.
About Smart Telecom:
Smart Telecom Pvt. Ltd. was established in May, 2008. It was established with the noble ambition of providing telecom and related services primarily to the deprived population of the rural areas of Nepal. The head office of the Company is located at Kumaripati, Lalitpur. The Company has an important role to play in the development of Telecom sector of Nepal in which the telecommunication penetration is only 20% of the total population. The company was awarded the Telecom License in July, 2008 to start the service initially to 398 remote VDCs of Nepal. The company will use both VSAT technology as well as GSM wireless technology to provide telecommunication service in those VDCs. Together with voice, message and data, it also intends to bring other value added services as per need of the rural population.
About Redknee:
Redknee is a leading global provider of innovative communication software products, solutions and services. Redknee's award-winning solutions enable operators to monetize the lifetime value of each subscriber transaction while personalizing the subscriber experience to meet mainstream, niche and individual market segment requirements. Redknee's revenue generating solutions provide advanced converged billing, rating, charging and policy for voice, messaging and new generation data services to over 70 network operators in over 50 countries. Established in 1999, Redknee Solutions Inc.(TSX: RKN) is the parent of the wholly-owned operating subsidiary Redknee Inc. and its various subsidiaries. References to Redknee refer to the combined operations of those entities. For more information, visit http://www.redknee.com/.
