Poynt Corp.’s mobile search service for smartphones will have access to 1.5 million business listings from the Yellow Pages Group under a five-year agreement announced Wednesday.
Consumers who have downloaded the Poynt local search app would pull up Yellow Pages listings when they look for a business, said Andrew Osis, CEO of Poynt Corp. (TSXV:PYN).
“So it really provides that true connection between consumers and merchants, ultimately,” Osis said Wednesday.
Poynt Corp. has applications for the BlackBerry, iPhone, Android and Windows Phone 7 smartphones to access the Yellow Pages listing.
The partnership also provides the Poynt app with mobile banner advertising through Yellow Page’s digital advertising division Mediative.
The announcement didn’t include financial details, Yellow Pages will pay Poynt an annual licensing fee, said Margaret Glover-Campbell, Poynt’s vice-president of marketing and public relations.
Yellow Media Inc. CEO Marc Tellier has said he expects about 20 per cent of the searches completed on its website yellowpages.ca will be done through mobile devices.
The Montreal-based company (TSX:YLO) also has said by the end of 2010 about 20 per cent of its expected $1.7 billion in revenue will come from digital sources.
Osis said his Calgary-based company has had a partnership with Yellow Pages Group for about the last four years.
Poynt operates in eight countries, including the United States, United Kingdom, France, Germany and Australia and has 37 employees, most of them based in Calgary. It will launch in India next year, Osis added.
Osis said some of his company’s clients include Deutsche Telecom in Germany and the largest independent directory in France.
Poynt will have about $1 million in revenues this year, Osis said, and is aiming to have “many multiples” of 2010’s revenues next year.
While Poynt works with directory companies, it’s exclusively a mobile search company and said it has had 4.7 million downloads of its free app. The company also sees potential growth for its app on computer tablets.
“Our application and functionality are exclusively on mobile devices,” said Glover-Campbell.
Yellow Pages Group said that Poynt will provide more visibility for advertisers.
“Our agreement with Poynt emphasizes the opportunities our content can create for local search apps and how YellowAPI can drive additional visibility to our advertisers through partners such as Poynt,” said Stephane Marceau, its chief marketing officer.
Poynt shares closed at seven cents on the TSX Venture Exchange, up half a cent. Yellow Media shares gained 3.7 cents to close at $6.26 on the Toronto Stock Exchange.