Wheelings and Dealings: Southbank Capital to Sell Voip-Pal.com

By David Delony
Contributing Writer

Southbank Capital, a corporate investment and advising firm based in Melbourne, Australia, has announced that it is selling Voip-Pal.com.

"Voip-Pal.com has an amazing collection of strategic patents that could potentially create a new worldwide Telco overnight for the company that owns these assets which have the ability to monetize VOIP," Southbank CEO Francis Galbally said.

"The Board and management of Voip-Pal are pleased with the progress being achieved by Southbank in the anticipated sale. They have a keen understanding of the Company's patented technology and its potential value,” Voip-Pal.com CEO and chairman Thomas Sawyer said.

Voip-Pal.com and Southbank had signed an engagement letter earlier this month to sell the company.

VoIP-Pal was also granted a patent earlier this year for routing, billing and rating in July. The patent brought the total number of patents issued to the company to six.

The company primarily deals with VoIP patent acquisition. Voip-Pal acquired Digifonica Gibraltar earlier this year. The company’s patent portfolio at the time of the acquisition was valued to be approximately $200 million.

As more business switch over to VoIP from traditional phone lines, Voip-Pal will make an attractive acquisition in turn, as it will let carriers who buy the company to offer features that their competitors can’t, making them more competitive.

“Revenues from this newly acquired patent portfolio will be derived from applying the technology to our own operations, future royalties through licensing agreements, and a white label program,” Dennis Chang, Voip-Pal president, said at the time.

One of the company’s major offerings is the ability of mobile and PC users to access business VoIP networks through their devices.

Edited by Maurice Nagle