Trintech would consider a dual listing on US and European stock exchanges given the recent hits taken by Irish companies quoted on the Nasdaq stock exchange.
Mr Cyril McGuire, joint managing director with his brother John of the Irish electronic payment software company, said the firm would learn from the experiences of its colleagues on the Nasdaq. "In that volatile market, it may be more appropriate to look at the European exchanges, and the possibility of a dual listing."
Mr McGuire said a stock market listing was just one option open to Trintech, and such a decision would only be taken when the "conditions in the market, and for shareholders, were right". He could not say when this might happen.
Trintech's progress will be bolstered with yesterday's announcement of an alliance with Compaq, the world's largest personal computer maker. Despite Compaq's surprise profit warning for its first quarter last week, Trintech expects a benefit of about $2 million (€1.85 million) from the deal this year alone.
Under the arrangement, Trintech will be Compaq's preferred technology to offer secure Internet payment transactions running on Compaq's server platforms. The two will engage in a joint market and sales arrangement worldwide. Since Compaq acquired Tandem Computers last year, around 75 per cent of all automated teller machine transactions run on Compaq technology.
Once Trintech's software has been validated and tested with Compaq hardware, it will be available through Compaq's ActiveAnswers, an online resource for marketing, selling and deploying business software to Compaq's partners and salesforce. Its users include a significant proportion of technology buyers for the global banking sector.
"The alliance provides customers with the most advanced payment processing hardware and software available, which enables them to cut transaction costs and allocate more resources to their core competencies," said Mr John McGuire.
Last August, Trintech secured $20 million in private funding - the largest single investment in an Irish software company to date. Since then, it has used the capital to finance it through a period of major growth. It has consolidated its US presence by setting up joint headquarters in Silicon Valley, California, and Dublin, where it officially opens a centre of e-commerce excellence this week.
Based beside its old location in the South County Business Park in Leopardstown, the 25,000 sq ft facility houses Trintech's 225 employees. Since last year, Trintech has practically doubled its workforce, and 22 people are now based in the US. It has also been granted planning permission for a second development on the five-acre site. Though there are no immediate plans, Mr Cyril McGuire says another 35,000 sq ft facility on the same site is possible.
In the past year Trintech has placed less emphasis on applying the highly stringent global secure electronic transaction standard to all its electronic payment products. It has moved instead to develop a hybrid of the SET and the more convenient Secure Socket Layer standard. Trintech says this is the first time an e-commerce payment product will allow banks, merchants and consumers to pay conveniently but with added security.
