Accesspoint Corporation (OTC BB: ASAP), a leading developer and manufacturer of e-commerce transaction solutions for the global business service sector, announced today that it has begun the development of support for Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) and Wireless Markup Language (WML) technologies into its award winning suite of products. For the thousands of businesses Accesspoint services, this means that these companies can extend their reach to include Internet and Wireless WAP support for PDA's, GSM mobile phones and pagers. Accesspoint believes that support for these types of Wireless Internet channels for delivery of rich media and payment services will be central to the strategic development of its customer's Internet presence.
According to top PC industry executives' statements at last week's Wireless 2000 conference, desktop computers will soon be overtaken as the leading method of accessing the Internet. Instead, wireless handheld devices will come to rule the market. Wireless industry analysts at Herschel Shosteck Associates predict there will be 126 million handheld computers and personal digital assistants by 2003. And, according to Gartner Group's (NYSE: IT) February study, worldwide sales of mobile handsets are booming, having grown by 65 percent in 1999 alone.
This overall market growth is fueling the widespread adoption of WAP technology. It is a relatively new technology standard that is aimed at turning mass-market mobile phones into network-based "smartphones." The race is on to create and tailor content that is WAP-ready for use with the predicted flood of handheld wireless devices such as mobile phones and Palm Pilots(TM) (NASDAQ: PALM). For example, last week Amazon.com (NASDAQ: AMZN) announced its new portal specifically designed for wireless users.
"We are quickly readying all of our technology for wireless application protocol to stay ahead of our competition. Accesspoint will enable its client companies' Web sites to be fully WAP accessible, thus enabling them to conduct WAP-based e-commerce. Our goal is to enable our clients' customers to buy products on the Internet with their cell phones or other handheld devices. In some countries this is already an everyday reality. In Finland, you can actually pay your bills by going online with your cell phone. You can even buy a can of coke from a vending machine, all with your cell phone. The applications are unlimited," says Tom Djokovich CEO of Accesspoint Corporation.
However, before the WAP-based e-commerce can become a major consumer trend, Web sites, including their e-commerce transaction capabilities, must be WAP-enabled.
"This represents a major market opportunity for Accesspoint. We already provide a state-of-the-art network for secure e-commerce transactions to thousands of merchants worldwide. Our solutions include a premier transaction engine, one of the only certified Level-III business-to-business purchase networks, and a full complement of e-commerce services which enable our customers to implement profitable online business strategies without having to support all of the in-house technologies and framework that are normally required. WAP/WML enabling is the next logical step for us and reflects our commitment to providing cutting edge solutions to our current and future clients," explains Djokovich.
Accesspoint believes the demand for wireless Internet access is increasing faster than anyone could have predicted and is quickly becoming one of the hottest trends in business technology today. Accesspoint has already begun the process of integrating WML support for WAP capabilities into the display functions of its entire product suite and anticipates having this upgrade completed later this year. Accesspoint intends to provide these new technologies to its current client and strategic partner including those of Equifax (NYSE: EFX), National Data Corp. (NYSE: NDC) and Retriever Payment Systems.
The added functionality will, expects Accesspoint, increase the accessibility of Accesspoint's client e-commerce Web sites to the millions of wireless device/cell phone users who already have access to the Internet and the millions more to come. This may allow transactions to be generated and processed from remote locations, increasing the speed and volume of service/product delivery.
WAP will be incorporated into Accesspoint's intelligent interface adaptive technology, which is known as Distributed Services Technology (DST). DST automatically tailors the format and level of detail provided by a Web site to each individual user, based on the type of device, version of browser and speed of connection with which the user is accessing the site. This means that Accesspoint's clients only have to design one single Web site that can be viewed and downloaded in a variety of different protocols. This eliminates the need for multiple sites that are each designed for only one segment of a company's customers.
Accesspoint plans to announce further details about Accesspoint's WAP integration program as well as other significant developments during this week's Electronic Transaction Association Conference in Las Vegas. Accesspoint staff members will be present for the entire conference, which runs from Tuesday March 7th through Friday March 10th.
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