News

PayStar hires consulting firm

March 20, 2002

LODI, Calif. - PayStar Corp. (OTCBB:PYST), a national provider of Internet kiosks, cashless ATMs, prepaid telecom services and wireless banking services, has retained Strategy Analysis International of Paris to assist Paystar in marketing its Gold Sprocket Internet kiosk software and Internet-enabled Info*Station kiosks, according to a PayStar news release.

PayStar chief executive officer William D. Yotty said that the consultants will provide strategy analysis to help PayStar expand internationally.

Telephony, especially the future of Internet-enabled communications, is SAI's core competency, the release stated. Strategy Analysis International has offices in Paris, Dusseldorf, Helsinki, Hong Kong, Montreal, Singapore, Tokyo and Toronto.

PayStar is aggressively developing pay-per-use Internet kiosks. Earlier this month PayStar announced it had purchased 1,000 public Internet kiosks owned by eKiosk Corp. of New Lenox, Ill.

PayStar's pay-for-use application, Gold Sprocket, was purchased from San Diego-based Fun e-Business in May, along with that company's kiosk assets, according to a May news release issued by PayStar.

PayStar also has a coin operated phone business, but the company is looking to diversify as phone revenues are dropping. The Vancouver Sun reported that in the U.S. more than 300,000 pay phones have been taken out of service in the past three years..

In February PayStar announced the purchase of Telad, an operator of more than 1,000 payphones in Oregon and Washington. Prior to the purchase, Telad had expanded its services to include public Internet access kiosks.

In June the Lodi, Calif.-based company announced it had signed an agreement to supply a minimum of 5,000 PayStar Info*Stations to Kiosk USA during the next two years.