WESTLB AG AND CLICKANDBUY SIMPLIFY EUROPEAN PAYMENTS FIELD

DÃœSSELDORF, Germany, ZUG, Switzerland, LONDON and PARIS, March 12 /PRNewswire/ --

- Joint SEPA Direct Debit Project Launched

DÃœSSELDORF, Germany, ZUG, Switzerland, LONDON and PARIS, March 12 /PRNewswire/ --

- ClickandBuy to Pass on Cost Advantages to Merchants


WestLB AG and ClickandBuy today launched the first Europe-wide
pilot project on the future Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA). Until now
companies and private persons in each member country have had to comply with
a variety of legal frameworks in the payments field. Going forward, payments
can be effected more easily and more cheaply throughout Europe via SEPA.
Under the model project, WestLB and ClickandBuy will simplify European
payments settlement at an early stage. The aim is to significantly reduce the
administrative costs of companies operating throughout Europe.


"ClickandBuy operates in all European countries. For each
country the company has to take into account a wide range of technical
requirements and the legal framework, which is expensive and ties up
resources. We will change this, and we will jointly introduce the new payment
formats", says Steffen Kowalski, Head of Transaction Services at WestLB and a
member of the European Payments Council. "This pilot project of WestLB and
ClickandBuy is the first of its kind and underpins the innovative power of
payment specialist ClickandBuy", added Kowalski.


"As the partner of WestLB, ClickandBuy will expand its
position as a European E-bank and will also achieve substantial cost
advantages as a result of the simplified payments procedure", says Norbert
Stangl, CEO and founder of ClickandBuy. "These cost advantages will benefit
our merchants - for example our partner Apple iTunes, for whom we process
payment transactions throughout Europe."


About SEPA


SEPA serves a market comprising over 61 billion transactions
Europe-wide. The creation of the Single Euro Payments Area is part of the
development and implementation of the single market in the European Union
(EU). As the most important body of the European banking industry, the
European Payments Council (EPC) has developed uniform pan-European products
which will be available throughout the EU from January 1, 2008. The
introduction of these products requires banks and customers to adopt fresh
approaches both technologically and strategically.


About WestLB AG


WestLB AG is a European commercial bank with headquarters in
North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany's most densely populated federal state. With
Group total assets of EUR 292.1 billion as of September 30, 2006, it is one
of Germany's leading financial services providers. It is the central
institution for the roughly 125 savings banks in North Rhine-Westphalia and
Brandenburg and acts as their link to the global financial markets. Working
in close partnership with the savings banks, WestLB offers the full range of
products and services of a universal bank, focusing on lending, structured
finance, capital market and private equity products, asset management,
transaction services and real estate finance. WestLB employed 5,853 staff as
of September 30, 2006. WestLB is one of Germany's leading banks in the
payments field. With a total of 1.7 billion transactions it has a market
share of approximately 11 per cent.


About ClickandBuy


ClickandBuy is one of the leading E-Payment systems in Germany
and Europe. In Switzerland ClickandBuy is operated by licensing partner
SWISSCOM and in other European markets by ClickandBuy (Europe) Ltd.
ClickandBuy will shortly also be available in Latin America via TELMEX. Today
over 7,000 suppliers already use ClickandBuy for payments settlement,
including Apple iTunes, T-Online, AOL, Skype, Meetic, Electronic Arts,
Stiftung Warentest - and more than 8,000,000 customers pay with ClickandBuy.


In January 2007 Intel invested in ClickandBuy. At the same
time ClickandBuy announced a global strategic partnership with Intel. In
August 2006 Deutsche Telekom acquired a ten per cent stake in ClickandBuy.
Deutsche Telekom and ClickandBuy intend to expand their existing cooperation
in strategic terms, with ClickandBuy assuming responsibility for the global
settlement of Deutsche Telekom's comprehensive range of products and
services. In January 2006, 3i also invested EUR 20 million to support
ClickandBuy in its strategy of international expansion.


Downloads:


http://www.clickandbuy.com/extra/download/press/releases_CaB_und WestLB_AG_070312.html



ClickandBuy
Headquarters
Andreas Horst
Director of Corporate Communications
Industriestrasse 18
6300 Zug
Switzerland
Tel.: +41-41-72-72-110
Fax: +41-41-72-72-119
E-mail: andreas.horst@clickandbuy.com
www.clickandbuy.com

WestLB AG
Armin Kloss
Press Spokesman
Telephone: +49-211-8-26-22-10
Email: Armin_Kloss@westlb.de

ClickandBuy Services AG