Veteran Card Executive Wells Named Vital CEO
Palmer Announces Resignation
Tempe, Ariz., Aug. 5, 2003 - Philip Tomlinson, President of TSYS® and Chairman of the Board of Vital Processing Services® (Vital®), today announced that Beverly Wells (Bev) has been named President and Chief Executive Officer of Vital, effective immediately.
Wells succeeds Jonathan Palmer, who announced that he is leaving Vital to attend to family responsibilities in Florida.
Wells, who has extensive financial and payments-related experience, retired from Wachovia Corporation in 2002 after 26 years of service. Most recently, she served as executive vice president for Wachovia's Retail Division including bankcard services and the acquiring business from the outsourced processing relationship as well as the acquirer back-office support function. In addition, Wells led Wachovia's $7.8 billion dollar credit card operation.
Wells will relocate with her family to Tempe, Arizona - Vital's corporate headquarters.
"Bev's knowledge, experience and management style combined with the strong management team at Vital will support our goals for growth and distinctive customer focus," Tomlinson said. "Bev has worked closely with the payments industry, from within Wachovia, but also in various industry forums. She is aware of the opportunities that exist for participants in the payments arena and the need for Vital to partner with its customers to achieve greater overall success as the industry's only pure acquirer processor."
"Jon has done an outstanding job of building a strong management team, strengthening the Vital brand in the marketplace and leading Vital capably during his four-year tenure," Tomlinson said. "Jon will work to ensure a smooth transition to Bev's leadership." Palmer joined Vital as CEO in 1999.
"Visa determined in the mid-90's that our member financial institutions needed a high quality, bank-owned processing partner. Today, Vital continues to play a key role in the processing equation. We look forward to working with Bev as we continue to create better, more cost-effective solutions and focus on servicing the needs of merchants on behalf of our bank partners," said Angela Brown, executive vice president of Visa U.S.A.
In 1996, Visa USA and TSYS formed Vital Processing Services as an independent joint venture company offering fully integrated merchant transaction and related electronic information services to financial institutions and their merchant customers. Visa continues to view Vital as an integral element of their overall payment strategy.
TSYS also considers Vital a key component of its strategy to offer comprehensive payments processing for the issuing and acquiring segments of the market.
Vital provides fully integrated products and services that enable acquirers to manage and grow their merchant business. Every day, Vital processes millions of electronic payments. And last year, over 6.5 billion of those transactions were authorized by Vital and more than 2.6 billion transactions were settled on Vital's Processing System.
Processing one out of every four electronic payment transactions in North America, Vital also processes for the top 25 acquirers in the United States. As the only pure acquirer processor in the industry, Vital focuses solely on helping its clients succeed and thrive.
During her years with Wachovia, Wells served in multiple leadership positions, including management of Wachovia's Treasury Services Group, ranked No. 1 in the country, and management of consumer lending and all retail branch activities.
About Vital Processing Services
The world's recognized leader in technology-based commerce enabling services, Vital Processing Services® (Vital®) brings the power of pure commerce to more than 300 Acquirers and one million Merchants. Vital delivers highly reliable, integrated end-to-end payment-related solutions to Acquirers and their Merchants, and provides them with the information and tools to efficiently manage their payment processing businesses. From authorizing and capturing electronic payments at the Merchant point of sale, to clearing and settling transactions, Vital is the only pure Acquirer processor in the industry. Vital is a joint venture of Visa U.S.A. and TSYS® ("NYSE: TSS"). Additional information regarding Vital can be found at www.vitalps.com.
Media Contacts:
Virginia Shaffer
Vice President, Corporate Communications
Vital Processing Services
480 333 7671
Virginia.Shaffer@vitalps.com
Ryan Boekelheide
Public Relations
Weber Shandwick
952 346 6234
rboekelh@webershandwick.com