Next Angel LLC Aquires Majority of Vivaro Corporation's Assets

In the latest news on the Vivaro Corporation Bankruptcy, a joint venture lead by Angel Telecom, Next Communications Inc. and Marcatel Telecommunications, LLC announced last month that they have acquired all of the assets of Vivaro Corporation and most all sub company assests. The joint venture company is to be called Next Angel LLC, with Angel Telecom having the largest stake at 42.5% overall.

Vivaro and six of it's sub companies including STi Prepaid, STi Telecom, Kare Distribution filed for Bankruptcy protection back in September of 2012 after running into some significant cash flow issues due to various missteps by the company in recent years. The companies main business revolved around selling prepaid calling cards to the Spanish speaking customers in the US and was once a very dominant player in the prepaid phone card industry.

Angel Telcom AG was founded in 2004 and is located in Switzerland. Their website which now shows as under construction includes a brief blurb about it's new aquisition and it's stargey going forward:

"as you already might have heard this year started out to be very exciting for Angel-Telecom. Significant network expansion and the successful acquisition of 42.5% of the assets of Vivaro Corp. in the US made us decide to give our website the long needed work over. We will soon be back with our relaunch1"

It's clear based on some comments posted in another article by Peter Waneck, Angel Telecom's CEO, that they truly believe in a solid future for prepaid calling cards, but also acknowledge that only through strong management and  forward looking behavior will they achieve success. Seems a little vague to put much belief in it, especially to those of in this business for years. Time will tell I guess but I wish them all luck!

A List of Some of Vivaro Corporation Creditors

I recently came across a list of some of Vivaro Corporation's outstanding creditors and the payment amount claimed to be owed. Here is a list of a few of the companies who have filed a claim with the courts to date:

• AFFILIATES OF VERIZON COMMUNICATIONS INC - $2,177,991.65
• BESTEL(USA) INC. - $275,508.62
• BLUE WOLF GROUP LLC - $107,840.00
• CALLTRADE CARRIER SVCS - $166,935.00
• CITY OF NEW YORK DEPARTMENT OF FINANCE - $410,259.00
• COMNET (USA) LLC - $406,588.30
• D EXPOSITO & PARTNERS - $800,684.72
• DEPARTMENT OF THE TREASURY - IRS - $195,794.95
• DIAMOND PHONE CARD - $15,000,000.00
• DIGICEL JAMAICA - $488,051.33
• EASTERN POINT COMMUNICATIONS LLC - $279,112.18
• EMPRESA NACIONAL DE TELECOMUNICACIONES SA - $840,553.90
• GENBAND US LLC - $122,079.00
• GEOTEL INTERNATIONAL LLC - $83,367.78
• GLOBAL INTERLINK LTD - $352,550.54
• IBASIS GLOBAL INC - $138,658.16
• ISEND LLC - $215,351.96
• JAZZ TELECOM S A U - $763,207.98
• LEVEL 3 COMMUNICATIONS LLC - About 2.5 million in total claims
• MARCATEL COM SA DE DV - 12,306,097.00
• RAZA COMMUNICATION INC - $3,393,167.96
• SPRINT - $17,376,272.48
• & many more...

A complete list is available here (you can search one by one or you also have the option to perform a search to get a complete list).

Please note this is only a partial list and only includes only companies who have field a claim with the courts. Other big companies on this list include many different local and state agencies throughout the country, Federal governement offices, real estate companies, banks, shipping service companies (UPS has a claim in for over 100k alone) and media agencies.

2012 - Phone Card Industry Year in Review

Well we are just about ready to say farewell to another year and for the phone card business, it wasn't the most exciting of years in recent history. Unfortunately just like the year before, the top stories continued to be focused around the FTC crack down on deceptive practices in the industry and bankruptcies.

Some of the top phone card related stories of 2012 included:

• The once powerful STI going into Chapter 11 Bankruptcy protection (Vivaro is the parent company)
• Skype pushing into the hard card space (available at 7-11, Best Buy and Radio Shack)
• FTC fining DR Phone Card for deceptive marketing practices (case still ongoing)
• IDT expanding it's Point of Sale activation products into Rite Aid stores
• Millenium Telecard paying a 2.3 million dollar settlement to FTC for alleged deceptive marketing practices
• Consumer Reports publishing scathing review on phone cards finding that most cards tested delivered far lower than the advertised minutes. This report led a month long media flurry around the subject, painting a terrible picture for an industry which cannot afford more negative press!

While all of the above are definitely not positive news items that is not to imply that there were not at least a few positive things this past year. For starters in 2012 there was a huge expansion and mass acceptance of the "virtual" type cards also known as Pinless products. The most popular of which seems to be the IDT Boss Revolution offer followed hot on their heels by VoxCall a SpeedyPin product. Another positive in 2012 was the huge growth seen with the International Mobile Top Up products (IMTU). The margins are a ot lower than traditional calling cards but the consumer demand is there and it has helped many distributors replace some of their lost calling card business.

To all of my readers and those in the business have a Happy and Safe New Year!

Here is to better things in 2013!

Updates on Vivaro Corp. Bankruptcy

It has been about three months now since the powerhouse phone card company Vivaro Corporation and it's child companies STI Prepaid LLC, Epana and Kare Distribution entered into chapter 11 bankruptcy protection (filed Sept 5th 2012). The company continues to operate but it is not clear as to how long they can continue to operate in this environment as some of their distributors begin to withhold payments (more about this later). Unfortunately since the initial filing news has been limited and the company representatives mostly tight lipped so I thought I would put out a post with all of the updates I could provide.

• In early September, Vivaro applied for and was granted by the courts the ability to continue to honor it's cards already in the channel.

• In mid September, Vivaro made it known that it was open to a buyout.

• In late September, Gustavo M. De la Garza the President of Vivaro Corporation, steps down from his position as chairman of The American PrePaid Phonecall Association (APPPA) and is replaced by Pete Pattullo, CEO of Network IP.

• According to an article in the Prepaid Press from October, Red Cherry/Sigma Prepaid took over distribution for Vivaro's NY/NJ cards and in contrast to what you would expect with a company in bankruptcy, Vivaro is giving more minutes than advertised in some cases. Most likely to help continue the consumer and distributor trust in their products.

• In early November, Vivaro sued one of it's major distributors Raza Communications over what it claims is $7.4 million in missed payments. No doubt more of these type of lawsuits will follow!

• Numerous lawsuits filed from the companies owed monies are in process against Vivaro.

There are clearly a lot of rumors floating around in the phone card world but I won't dive into those and will stick with the known facts right now. I will post more information as it becomes publicly available!

Is this the End for STI?

Vivaro Corporation, the parent company for STI, filed a voluntary chapter 11 bankruptcy petition this past past week in the NYC bankruptcy court for all of it's telecom related units including: Kare Distribution Inc, STI CC 1, LLC, STI CC 2, LLC, STI Telecom, Inc, STI Prepaid, LLC and TNW Communications.

Reason for Filling
Vivaro's revenues' have dropped by over 40% since 2010 and their total liabilities are double that of their current assets. Their cash flow situation is what forced them to finally to file for chapter 11 protection having slightly less than $150,000 in cash

Who they Owe the Most?
Sprint - $4.5 million dollars
Telecommunication Relay Service - $2.7 million dollars
Telecom Italia Sparkle - $2 million dollars
Verizon - $1.9 million dollars
Level 3 - $1.3 million dollars

How Many Phone Cards are Currently on the Street?
According to the bankruptcy filing, they have about 22 million unused active cards currently on the market representing about $31.2 million face value dollars.

What are Some of their Card Brands?
Digame, Mi Carnal, STI Family, El Chavo, Eroika, STI Edge, and Clarito

How Many Employees Jobs are Currently at Risk?
In total all of the companies listed above has a total of 231 full time employees & 64 part time employees.

What's Next?
It is important to note that chapter 11 does not mean the company is closing down, it just means that they are trying to seek temporary relief from creditors so that they can restructure and hopefully emerge more stable. However, the odds seem to be against Vivaro since most telco's in this position usually end up going to chapter 7 (bankruptcy) within weeks or months. Vivaro has made it clear that they need more time and absolutely cannot have their big creditors shut them down as they need to be able to honor all of the cards currently on the street as failure to continue to provide service for these cards will make a recovery all but impossible. There is a hearing on the motion is scheduled for September 10th.

Stay tuned for updates...