transcosmos Expands its Call Center Business for English/European Language Market and Enhances its Multi-language Support/Back-office Functions for E-Commerce

transcosmos inc. (Headquarters: Tokyo, Japan; President and COO: Masataka Okuda; TSE First Section: 9715; hereafter, transcosmos) and Merlin Information Systems Group Limited (Headquarters: Milton Keynes, United Kingdom; CEO: Richard Patterson; hereafter, Merlin), a British BPO company, have agreed for transcosmos to increase its investment and acquire 85% of the companies stock. Merlin will become a subsidiary of transcosmos and change the company name to transcosmos Information Systems Limited.

Merlin is a U.K. based BPO company founded in 1991. The company provides multi-language business process outsourcing and call center services covering English and European-language speaking countries for its global clients in the U.S. and Europe from its operational sites located in the U.K., U.S., Hungary and in the Philippines.

Since forming a business and capital alliance with Merlin in 2011, transcosmos has been expanding its services in the English and European language-speaking market while acquiring know-how for call center operations in the U.S. and Europe. Now, with this closer alliance, transcosmos further drives its efforts to strengthen account management for its client companies in the U.S. and Europe as well as providing BPO/ Call center services for Japanese and Asian customers in the European region.

transcosmos will further develop multi-language customer support and back-office functions in the European region to additionaly globalize its E-Commerce business, while leveraging Merlin’s near-shore and off-shore operational sites.

Richard Patterson said “This announcement is an exciting new page in the history of Merlin and one that, after 25 years, the shareholders and management believe is the right step to enable us to grow and fulfil Merlin’s potential.

Being part of TCI means being part of a company with nearly $2 billion in revenues and over 40,000 employees in over 34 countries around the world. TCI has acquired Merlin because of the skills and expertise of our people, exceptional client base and our knowledge and experience, in particular, of the European and North American markets.

Merlin will now be able to take advantage of transcosmos broad range of BPO and E-commerce services and solutions to expand our capability and improve services to customers.”

■transcosmos Information Systems Company Overview

Company Name:            transcosmos Information Systems Limited

Representative:              Chief Executive Officer Richard Patterson

Number of Employees: 600 (approximate)

Service Offerings:          Business process outsourcing service, Call center service

Operational Centers:     United Kingdom (Milton Keynes), United States (Austin), Hungary (Budapest, Debrecen), Philippines (Manila)

Supported Languages:  English and 13 European languages including French, German, Italian, Spanish, Russian and Dutch

* transcosmos is a registered trade name or trademark of transcosmos inc. in Japan and other countries.

* Other company names and product or service names mentioned are registered trade names or trademarks of various other companies.

■About transcosmos inc.

transcosmos launched operations in 1966. Since then we have combined superior “human resources” with up-to-date “technological” capabilities to enhance the competitive strength of our clients by providing them with superior and valuable services. transcosmos currently offers Cost Reduction Services (Contact Center, HR/Financial/Sales Back Office, Order Management/SCM, System Development/Management etc.) and Sales Expansion Services (Big Data Analysis, Internet Advertising, Website Construction/Management, Smartphone/SNS Utilization, Telemarketing etc.). transcosmos continues to pursue operational excellence by providing these services through our 159 locations in 28 countries with a focus in Asia. Furthermore, following the expansion of E-Commerce market on the global scale, transcosmos provides a comprehensive, one-stop global E-Commerce service to deliver our clients' excellent products and services to consumers in 40 countries. transcosmos aims to be the “Global BPO Partner” of our clients to provide them with high quality BPO services on a global scale.