Mercury Callpoint Ltd has hit upon a novel way of expanding its Telepoint network, by signing with Automated Security Holdings Plc, Europe’s largest electronic security supplier. Under the deal, Automated Security’s 170,000 Modern Alarms subscribers will be offered the chance to provide the site for a Mercury base station, which will be linked into the public switched telephone network through Automated Security’s communication centres – at the moment, the lines running from the alarms to these centres are used only for an average of two minutes a year. If the idea takes off, it will mean that the size of the Mercury network will be a clear second to that of the British Telecommunications Plc Phonepoint service – but this will depend on the incentive given to Automated Security’s subscribers to have base stations installed on their scheme has yet to established, and it is likely that deals will vary from customer to customer: Automated Security has suggested that possible agreements would involve its wholly-owned service and support division Modern Alarms contributing in a number of different ways to the telephone bills of those customers that decide to participate, and offering them attractive deals on new alarm systems. For its part, Automated Security will receive marketing rights to the Callpoint service among its corporate customers. Mercury Callpoint is a joint venture company formed by three communications companies, Mercury Communications Ltd, Motorola Inc’s Motorola UK Ltd and Shaye Communications Ltd.
