Heartland Buys Debitek, Pushes Deeper into Small-Value Payments

Heartland Payment Systems Inc., a publicly held acquiring processor based in Princeton, N.J., announced today it has acquired Debitek, a provider of closed-loop stored-value systems based in Chattanooga, Tenn., from terminal maker Ingenico Corp. Terms of the transaction, which was structured as a stock purchase, were not disclosed. The deal furthers Heartland Payment's penetration of the small-value electronic transaction market through stored value, as Debitek's systems handle payments for such functions as laundries and vending machines on college campuses, corporate complexes, and prisons. Last month, Heartland announced it had made an undisclosed “strategic investment” in Parcxmart Technologies Inc., which provides card-based systems for parking meters as well as merchants selling small-value items. Heartland, which had already struck an agreement to sell credit and debit card processing to merchants that take Parcxmart, said at the time it would “promote [Parcxmart] aggressively along with our credit and debit card processing services.” Debitek, which maintains an installed base of 130,000 points of sale, provides systems that include cards, re-loading “stations,” card readers, and settlement software. Its systems can load value onto either mag-striped or chip-based cards. Clients include the University of Florida, BMW, Coca-Cola, and the federal penitentiary system. “A prepaid and stored-value solution is an idea platform to capitalize on the growth opportunities of small-dollar transactions, which is a large and rapidly emerging electronic payment solutions market,” said Robert Carr, chairman and chief executive of Heartland, which serves 110,000 small and medium-sized merchants, in a statement. “We are excited about the opportunity to broaden our product offering while also entering the new markets already served by Debitek solutions.”