Elephant Talk Communications, Inc., recently announced that it has agreed to purchase a majority stake in Billion Online Limited (BOL), an integrated IP-based telecom solutions developer in China.
This acquisition provides the Company an immediate entry into the worldwide Voice Over Internet Protocol (VoIP) market on PC-to-phone, packet telephony and other Internet-related services while increasing its presence and telecom service offerings throughout China and the Fareast
Billion Online is a popular China-based system integrator serving major sectors of the Internet industry in China. It's top selling PC-to-phone system, "iTalk", is branded as "eTalk" by ElephantTalk. "eTalk" users can download software and purchase an access PIN through the web and start talking to their friends over the phone in minutes. Quality is comparable to regular toll quality while significantly reducing the cost for the user. Since ElephantTalk began marketing the service in September 2002 it has become one of the hottest PC-to-phone services in the Fareast. China Unicom is also co-branding the service to its customers throughout China. In addition, BOL's newest product, the Next Generation SoftsWitch (NGSW), has been launched in Shanghai to serve the broadband telephony subscribers of China Railcom and its strategic partner, China-on-line Inc. BOL also provides an Enterprise Instant Message (EIM) service, a communication tool utilized in Virtual Private Networks within organizations to increase productivity.
"Our investment in BOL will allow us the latitude to move beyond the traditional wholesale voice industry into the extended service provider's business. We will co-brand or OEM our existing iTalk and eTalk PC-to-phone products and work with our ISP partners not only in the Asian regions but worldwide," said Mr. Russelle Choi, Chairman & CEO of ElephantTalk. "With BOL's Next Generation SoftsWitch, it will also help us to serve the new operators, especially the cable operators, to provide the next generation broadband telephony and other IP related services to their subscribers in a timely manner."
