"We chose Geneva for our EMEA headquarters because of its leading role as a global center for international trade, banking, and telecommunications," said Stratton Sclavos, president and CEO of VeriSign. "Headquartering in Geneva enables us to work directly with our partners to meet their needs, forge stronger relationships with our customers, and ultimately achieve our first goal - giving people the confidence to engage in commerce and communications in a trusted digital environment."

VeriSign began operations in 1995 and over the years has grown to provide a range of digital trust services powered by a global infrastructure that manages five billion network connections and transactions a day. The company has four core offerings: Web presence services, security services, payment services, and telecommunications services. VeriSign is a provider of the digital identity of over 6.5 million business and individual customers, the company says.

Through its network of European channel partners and directly, VeriSign will deliver localized domain name registration services, e-mail, secure site seals, brand management, digital payment and authentication services to consumers and small to mid-sized businesses.

The VeriSign Trust Network of PKI affiliates has provided European enterprises, financial institutions and government organizations with advanced implementations of VeriSign digital trust services, such as use of secure smart cards and soon with citizen ID cards. PKI affiliates represent VeriSign in the UK, Sweden, Denmark, Iceland, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Netherlands, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Poland, Israel, Egypt, Kuwait and South Africa.

The newly established Geneva support center will give VeriSign affiliates access to increased levels of technical training and sales support to deliver these services, the company said. VeriSign will move product creation teams to the Geneva headquarters to build European technology platforms used by affiliates. VeriSign will also fulfill country-specific legal, policy, and technical requirements with the creation of a local test facility.