By PETER GRIFFIN
Payment terminals company Cadmus Technology sweetened its annual meeting in Auckland yesterday with news of a $700,000 deal struck with Malaysian distributor eScience Systems.
In its third deal in the Malaysian market, Cadmus will supply 1000 terminals and more orders are likely to follow.
Although deals that size are
unlikely to see Cadmus rivalling any of the global vendors in electronic finance terminals anytime soon, managing director Ian Bailey is content to secure just a tiny sliver of the $687 million market for terminals in the Asia Pacific region.
"We're not trying to dig our way to China. You don't want to go into a market like the US where someone gives you an order for 50,000 units. It would kill you," he said. Instead, Cadmus was targeting markets such as Malaysia and Australia, where it could meet demand quickly.
Early last year, Cadmus was trumpeting its purchase of a 4.5 per cent stake in Australian company Insight Technologies for $600,000. That investment has now been written off.
Bailey said Insight specialised in loyalty programmes, which Cadmus turned out to have little use for. Cadmus still held the stake in Insight but placed no value on it.
Of the 29 million eftpos terminals in use around the world, the majority would have to be replaced to incorporate the EMV (Europay, Mastercard, Visa) security standards, he said.
Cadmus will need to get its software certified with the Malaysian "electronic purse" system for the deal to proceed.
