Lori Sofianek to Join WorldGate as Senior Vice President of Customer Operations

TREVOSE, Pa.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--WorldGate Communications, Inc. (OTCBB: WGAT), a leading provider of next-generation video phone solutions announced that Lori Sofianek has joined the company as Senior Vice President of Customer Operations.

“Together, these two strategies significantly increase WorldGate’s market and distribution opportunities. So I am excited that Lori is joining our team and will lead Customer Operations. She brings a tremendous amount of telecommunications experience, a proven history of success and her energy and leadership will be invaluable.”

“Our strategy is to transform WorldGate, from not only a manufacturer of high quality video phones, but also a service operating company that provides Turn-Key Digital Video Phone Services directly to end using customers,” said Robert Stevanovski, Chairman of WorldGate. “Together, these two strategies significantly increase WorldGate’s market and distribution opportunities. So I am excited that Lori is joining our team and will lead Customer Operations. She brings a tremendous amount of telecommunications experience, a proven history of success and her energy and leadership will be invaluable.”

“I am very excited to be joining the team at WorldGate to help develop our new service offering that will enable companies and organizations with large market distribution networks to provide their customers with our Digital Video Phone Services,” added Lori.

WorldGate’s Next Generation Consumer Video Phone

• New hardware and software platform
• Featuring the powerful TI DaVinci DSP / ARM platform

WorldGate’s Turn-Key Digital Video Phone Service

• Digital Phone Services, allowing customers to replace their traditional telephone service and utilize their broadband internet service to call any phone number, anywhere in the world. Included will be calling features, like voice mail, video mail, call waiting, caller ID, call forwarding, and speed dial.
• Complete back-office customer support, including online order entry, provisioning, billing, credit & collections, customer care and technical support.
• Branding unique to each partner at every customer touch point, including the video phone, online, customer communications, billing and customer care.

Lori Sofianek Biography

Prior to joining WorldGate, Lori was most recently Senior Vice President of Cassara Management Group, Inc. based in Rochester, NY. Lori has more than 25 years of experience in the telecommunications sector. She has spent time in many different areas of the business including sales, sales management, sales support, marketing, customer service, order management, provisioning, billing and customer collections.

Lori started her career in telecommunications in 1983 working in Rochester Telephone’s long distance division, RCI, leading the first direct sales force for long distance and private line services. After several years in sales, Lori followed an operations path. As Rochester Telephone and RCI acquired several local and long distance companies, Lori took on operational roles of increasing responsibility, managing the integration of all systems and customer operations. In her last position at Global Crossing (formerly Frontier and RCI) she was the vice president of international customer support for the wholesale division.

In recent years, Lori has worked directly with the senior leadership teams of many telecom companies, including Pangea, a European facilities based carrier, ACN, a global direct marketing company for local, long distance, mobile and VoIP services, ION, a start up addressing the New York rural marketplace and Americatel, a reseller of long distance services in the Hispanic marketplace.

Lori has a bachelor’s degree in Psychology from Hartwick College.

This press release may contain forward-looking statements that are made pursuant to the safe-harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Expressions of future goals and similar expressions including, without limitation, expressions using the terminology “may,” “plans,” “expects,” “anticipates,” “forecasts,” and expressions which otherwise reflect something other than historical fact are intended to identify forward-looking statements, including statements regarding WorldGate’s strategy and expected product offerings. These forward-looking statements involve a number of risks and uncertainties, including risks relating to obtaining sufficient funding and developing appropriate technology solutions and the other risks and uncertainties described in the Company’s filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The actual results may differ materially from any forward-looking statements due to such risks and uncertainties. No obligation is undertaken to revise or update any forward-looking statements in order to reflect events or circumstances that may arise after the date of this release.