By Brice Wallace Deseret News business writer

Ikano is undergoing the types of growing pains a lot of companies would love to feel.

But the company has eased some of its "discomfort" by opening a Salt Lake call center expected to be at its 1,000-employee capacity by year-end.

"Ikano is experiencing astonishing growth," said Henry Smith, founder, president and chief executive officer. The company has picked up more than 70 branded partners within the past six months, bringing the total number of branded partners to 160. "This growth spurt necessitates a larger call center capable of supporting our increasing customer base."

The Salt Lake-based company helps its branded partners, including many universities and brick-and-mortar stores, establish a strong Internet presence. The work has fueled staff growth, from about 50 employees in January to more than 250 currently, and the opening of offices in San Francisco, New York and Cincinnati, all in the past six months.

"Companies are looking for a technology solution to bring them from the offline world to the online world," Smith said. "People are giving us their brand names and we're responsible for caring for brands that have been developed over a number of years. We are taking companies trying to figure out their Web strategy and reintegrating them with their customer base, and we're kind of the first company doing it."

The 28,000-square-foot call center at the International Center near the Salt Lake International Airport has about 100 employees now. A few months ago, a few dozen worked in call operations at company headquarters.

"It's a very significant step," Cammi Vanderbeek, the company's marketing and communications writer, said of the new call center. "We have some very, very large corporations coming online with Ikano, and for us to successfully manage the end users and the relationships for the branded partners signing up, we needed to be able to expand our staff."

The center, which opened July 8, will be a source for technical support, customer support and "Ask the Expert" services. The expert chat feature helps provide answers to questions by using the Internet. The company also can "push" Internet sites to customers.

"We have the ability to 'push' a Web page to a customer while online in order to help them with the information they need," said Todd Krause, director of customer service. "If a customer needs help locating a particular Web page, we can make the proper page pop up on their system while the customer is online with the representative, as opposed to having them type in the address."

The center also is designed to allow the company to maintain a low average call answer rate -- it is 17 seconds this month -- and a call drop rate of less than 4 percent. The goal for answering e-mails is within an hour, Krause said, calling that standard "pretty good , considering the industry average is 24 hours."E-MAIL: bwallace@desnews.com

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