PRESS RELEASE
December 16, 2003
For Immediate Distribution
Verus Acquires Global eTelecom
NASHVILLE, TN. Verus Financial Management, Inc., a Nashville based payment processing company, announced it has purchased the assets of Global eTelecom, a Destin, Florida based provider of advanced electronic check processing services. Verus now provides payment services to over 58,000 merchants in the United States and this is the fifth acquisition made by Verus since its inception in 2002.
Global eTelecom is a national payment processor that provides a leading electronic check conversion engine to merchants, banks and independent sales organizations. By partnering with the payment processing industry’s leading Independent Sales Organizations, Global eTelecom provides a significant value added product for its partners and merchants. The Company intends to continue its strong partnership with existing sales organizations and will continue to honor the confidentiality and trust established over the past few years.
Richardson M. Roberts, Chairman & CEO of Verus commented, "I am excited about the prospect of working with Ron Williams and his team at Global eTelecom. They are a high quality organization and provide an excellent fit to our strategy of providing additional point of sale products other than credit card processing in order to add value to our customers and ultimately our shareholders. We have great respect for the strong sales partnerships Global e Telecom has created and look forward to enhancing those relationships in the future."
Ron Williams, President of Global eTelecom, states, “We are extremely pleased to be joining the forward thinking, growth oriented management team at Verus as we share their vision of providing a one-stop solution for all a variety of electronic payments at the point-of-sale to small and mid-sized merchants across the country. We look forward to continue providing our products and services to our partners and customers and are pleased to join the Verus organization”.
About Verus Financial Management, Inc.:
Verus Financial Management Inc., a privately held Nashville, TN based company established in 2002, is a leading consolidator of successful payment processors into a "best practices" payment services company. Founded by Richardson M. Roberts, former CEO of PMT Services, Verus offers solutions through its wholly owned subsidiaries that include a wide range of payment processing services that meet the needs of traditional and non-traditional merchants. These services include electronic payment processing for associations, retail, mail order/telephone order and Internet based merchants. Additionally, the company's proprietary gateway provides OEM software makers in a variety of vertical markets with the ability to build a flexible payment module into their billing modules, allowing added convenience to their merchant bases, while creating new and attractive revenue streams for these technology partners. Verus, Latin for "true, fair or just," takes the best practices of its subsidiaries and leverages them across the Verus family of providers, partners and merchants.