Voice Commerce, an innovative financial services group, is today announcing an agreement to provide payment and mobile money services to mobile operators through Alcatel-Lucent's (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) Mobile Wallet Service (MWS).

Mobile service providers can now deliver fully regulated end-to-end financial services, with the capabilities enabled by this agreement. Voice Commerce, which recently launched its Cashflows® services, operates various financial services under licences covering the provision of payments, e-money services and is a membership of both Visa EU and MasterCard. This offering places mobile operators at the centre of mobile commerce because they can offer secure, regulated financial transactions to their customers.

This global offer is particularly well suited to mobile service providers in emerging markets where the mobile phone is used to deliver financial services, as it will enable them to meet the needs of those customers with a broader range of services such as mobile remittances and payments. The MWS can also be deployed in developed markets where consumers are interested in using the mobile phone for payments, coupons and loyalty programs.

The market for electronic mobile wallet services is growing fast and Gartner Group predicts it could reach $245 billion in value by 2014. Edgar, Dunn and Company predicts that mobile wallet users will reach 1.4 billion by 2015. Nick Holland, senior analyst, M-Commerce, Yankee Group commented: "We expect mobile payments to be an area of significant growth over the next few years as consumers are won over by the convenience, speed and security of paying by phone."

"Together with Alcatel-Lucent and mobile operators, we see the opportunities for consumers to manage their every day financial needs with their mobile phone,” said Nick Ogden, CEO of Voice Commerce. “At Voice Commerce we have focussed on developing new, innovative and regulated services, and this, coupled with the recent launch of our Cashflows® services, we believe will support mobile operators in delivering new services to their customers. Voice Commerce with Alcatel-Lucent’s MWS, enables mobile operations to accelerate their "go to market" offer of electronic wallet services, as all the financial services requirements and technical capabilities are delivered as an end-to-end service.”

“Our goal is to provide a complete mobile money eco-system for the mobile operator,” said Anthony Belpaire, general manager, Alcatel-Lucent Mobile Wallet Service. “For fast adoption of services across existing point-of-sale terminals, our customers need compliance with e-money licensing schemes and interoperability with global payment networks. Voice Commerce provides a unique market accelerator to make MWS a complete solution for mobile operators “

About Voice Commerce Group

Many of the innovations and standards used in internet, electronic, mobile and emerging e-money payment systems since the emergence of the commercial Internet in 1994 were developed by the team at Voice Commerce Group, including the creation of the Internet and Mobile Payments Guarantees, in 2001 and 2010 that protect businesses and cardholders from fraud.

Companies within the Voice Commerce Group are authorised by the UK Financial Services Authority under the Payment Services Regulations and provide a range of payment, electronic, and mobile money services.

Voice Commerce is a Principal Member of VISA and MasterCard and has contractual service relationships with American Express and other payment schemes where it operates as a principal. Voice Commerce Group is required to maintain appropriate financial capital adequacy. Group and certain outsourced operational services are delivered to the PCI DSS Level 1 standard. For further information please visit: http://www.voicecommercegroup.com

About Cashflows®

Cashflows® delivers a range of business to business financial services that are provided from a single account, designed to help businesses manage and maximise their cashflow. The Cashflows® account enables businesses to offer their customers a full range of payment options including retail, online, mobile and e-money payments. The Cashflows® account is fully integrated into the e VoicePay® mobile money service which delivers guaranteed transactions. For further information please visit: www.cashflows.com

About Alcatel-Lucent

Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) is the trusted transformation partner of service providers, enterprises, strategic industries such as defense, energy, healthcare, transportation, and governments worldwide, providing solutions to deliver voice, data and video communication services to end-users. A leader in fixed, mobile and converged broadband networking, IP and optics technologies, applications and services, Alcatel-Lucent leverages the unrivalled technical and scientific expertise of Bell Labs, one of the largest innovation powerhouses in the communications industry. With operations in more than 130 countries and the most experienced global services organization in the industry, Alcatel-Lucent is a local partner with a global reach. Alcatel-Lucent achieved revenues of Euro 15.2 billion in 2009 and is incorporated in France, with executive offices located in Paris.

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