US / Africa : Convergys Corporation announced that Vodacom, South Africa's largest wireless operator with more than 12 million subscribers, has gone live with an advanced billing solution based on Convergys' Infinys(TM) software.

Inset is Jean-Herve Jenn, President of Convergys' Information Management Group for EMEA quoted below.

The Convergys solution, consisting of Infinys software and professional and consulting services, bolsters Vodacom's position in an increasingly competitive marketplace. Infinys is currently handling 1.5 million postpaid subscribers and rating up to 13 million events daily with an average of more than 200 million events per month. Infinys is helping Vodacom improve efficiencies and revenue assurance, and has already enabled the South African operator to invoice its service providers 6 days earlier in the month. By supporting Vodacom's entire wholesale business, Infinys is enabling the company to innovate around 2.5 and 3G services, reduce time to market for new products and services, and drive competitive differentiation.

A team of Convergys professionals was based in Cape Town, South Africa, to support the successful implementation, migration, and integration of Vodacom's wholesale GSM, TAP, GPRS, and data services to the Infinys rating and billing software. With the completion of this project, Vodacom has a highly flexible, sophisticated solution capable of processing hundreds of millions of records per month - essential qualities in a tier-one wholesale billing environment.

"I was very impressed with the functionality and capabilities of Infinys. We were able to take 10 years of bespoke product development on our legacy system and simply configure Infinys by means of parameters to achieve the same product offerings," said Allan Beets, Executive Director of Billing and IT at Vodacom. "The support team, consisting of Vodacom and Convergys staff, enabled us to migrate our billing onto Infinys in record time and the migration was achieved without affecting a single revenue stream."

"This 'go-live' of Vodacom's wholesale subscribers was an important milestone in a multi-phase rollout of Infinys designed to enhance the responsiveness and efficiency of Vodacom's complex operation," said Jean-Herve Jenn, President of Convergys' Information Management Group for EMEA. "The success of this implementation and the relationship we have developed with Vodacom strengthens our position in the region. Additionally, it showcases to the wider African and international marketplace the value of Convergys' professional and consulting services and Infinys, which offers true real-time convergent billing, low risk, and low total cost of ownership."

Benefits of the Convergys solution to Vodacom include:

-- Enhanced responsiveness and scalability - rating over 200 million events per month with increased capacity to respond quicker to regulatory and market demands for new and flexible tariffs

-- Improved operational efficiencies - invoicing service providers now more efficiently (6 days earlier in the month) and improved ability to bill and rate for new services, configure attractive bundles, and discount plans

-- Future-proof support - provides support for all existing and future 2.5/3G services

-- Phased approach - represents the first step in a phased, road-mapped, migration strategy that rolls out the benefits of Infinys across Vodacom's wider business footprint without disrupting the company's ongoing operations.

With more than 20 years of experience in billing and customer care, Convergys combines its broad portfolio of professional and consulting services, deep technical and operational expertise, and award-winning Infinys software to solve our clients' complex BSS and CRM business problems. Convergys is outthinking and outdoing(TM) on behalf of its clients every day.