Pernec Katchi to invest US$8.5 million in City Mix phone booths

Pernec Katchi will invest up to US8.45 million for 3,500 sites in the next three years.

The phone booths are slated to be the first communications channel that can put up a nationwide campaign within 72 hours. The new booths combine the function of a payphone together with static and scrolling advertising panels on the other (road) side.

Zainun Aishah Ahmad, chairman at Pernec Paypoint, said the Pernec Katchi collaboration plans to roll out 1,000 City Mix booths in the first year; and subsequently 1,000 in the second year and 1,500 in the third, in various locations around the country.

He added that Pernec Paypoint currently has more than 40,000 phone booths nationwide, which are potential sites to be turned into City Mix booths.

“With City Mix, we will be able to offer harmonisation of the advertising format and flexibility of the campaign periods, ranging from two weeks to one month,” he noted.

PayPoint is currently operating under its brand name, Helo.

Marceline Lemarie, CEO at Katchi Group, noted that the partnership has resulted in a reinvention of payphones in Malaysia. 

“The Pernec Katchi City Mix pay phone is a masterful blend of functional communication networks fused with state-of-the-art technology, breathing new life into the public pay phone industry. It will no longer be just a phone,” she added.

Katchi is part of the Stroer Group, which made its foray into the emerging markets of Asia Pacific in 2008.