Mobile


Looking to China’s Skipped Generation

China’s miraculous economic catch up since reform and opening up has created an unprecedented generation of consumers. The way this generation has adopted the on-line world in China is very different from that in the West.

Global mobile money transfer to top $10 billion in 2013

The value of international money transfers made via mobile phones will exceed $10bn for the first time this year, according to Juniper Research. However, the cost and complexity of regulating cash transfer has led many service providers to focus exclusively on airtime top ups, the research firm reported.

Consumers don’t trust mobile payments study finds

Fewer than one in four of UK consumers would use their smartphone like a credit card to make payments even if they had the relevant app, according to a new survey carried out by YouGov on behalf of outsourcing firm Firstsource Solutions.

Ingo Money’s MDC Service with Visa Prepaid Goes Live (Oct. 24, 2013)

Oct. 24, 2013 Mobile deposit capture took a big step toward mainstream adoption in the prepaid industry with the announcement this week that Ingo Money Inc.’s mobile deposit capture pilot with Visa, which began last year, is officially out of beta. Ingo Money’s service enables consumers to deposit checks into their Visa Prepaid card accounts by […]

Next Stop, Contactless (October 2013)

Amid big transit rollouts in Chicago and Salt Lake City, Las Vegas is getting in on the action with a new pilot program enabling transit riders to pay bus fares with a tap.

FEXCO Acquires Mobile Payments Startup FLASHiZ (Oct. 22, 2013)

FEXCO, a provider of financial transaction processing, foreign exchange and outsourcing services based in Ireland, has acquired mobile payments and loyalty startup FLASHiZ, with BNP Paribas Personal Finance taking a minority shareholder stake in the Luxembourg-based company.

China’s Alipay Reboots Digital Wallet, Heads to Taiwan (Oct. 17, 2013)

China’s giant retail payments operator Alibaba Group this week announced plans to expand its Alipay online payment service to Taiwan and simultaneously unveiled key upgrades to Alipay’s digital wallet, significantly increasing customers’ options for online and offline purchases.

Blog: Mobile App Permissions: Scaring Users and Haunting Developers?

Please let me use your camera. Do you mind if I browse through your contacts so I know all your family and friends, and can call or text each at my discretion? To the uninitiated, these eerie questions read like a disturbed love note from a stalker. But these are common permissions requests for many mobile apps. Could they scare off users?

‘Square Cash’ Joins Crowded P2P Field (Oct. 16, 2013)

Square Inc. is wading into the crowded U.S. P2P field this week with Square Cash, taking a somewhat unique debit card-based approach versus competitors by enabling Visa and MasterCard debit cardholders to send funds to each other free of charge via email.

Mobile payments success needs complete ecosystem

The public is ready to adopt mobile payments in many aspects of their lives, but service providers need to have a defined role in the ecosystem and an understanding of how they interact with other players and the consumer.

Pay Mobile: Money2020 Edition (Oct. 11, 2013)

This week in Las Vegas more than 4,500 attendees gathered for the second annual Money2020 conference. Companies across the payments value chain took the opportunity to showcase their latest partnerships, technology or programs with a deluge of announcements charting the future of money.

Financial institutions are “missing out” on big data says TeleWare

As financial regulation on mobile phone recording grows ever tighter in Europe, a significant proportion of financial institutions still haven’t put in place any technology to handle it. They could be missing out, according to Steve Haworth, chief executive at computer telephony specialist TeleWare.

Money2020: PayPal Cracks QR Codes (Oct. 10, 2013)

PayPal added another key piece to its POS strategy this week with the introduction of Payment Code, a QR code-based approach enabling consumers to pay by scanning the PayPal mobile app at checkout.

Lessons on living in a real-time payments world

Coming to the US to tell an audience of payments specialists about how the UK has transformed its national infrastructure over the past five years with the introduction of an effectively real-time payment system might have been considered a rough assignment – what can the Brits teach the wider world, particularly the US, about payments […]

PayPal points to global reach

Don Kingsborough, vice president of retail and prepaid products at PayPal, had a clear message for Money2020 delegates in Las Vegas yesterday: “The future is actually now.”

Zapp: putting banks back in the m-payments picture

Formed earlier this year, Zapp expects to launch next year with the backing of most of the major UK retail banks, Peter Keenan, chief executive of the venture, says that at the time of launch the Pay by Zapp service will be available to 40% of UK current account holders, and it will have the backing of 50% of the nation’s online and mobile retailers – including well-known brands.

Mobile payments – the tipping point

There comes a tipping point when market readiness, social behaviour and technology combine to create a sudden, ubiquitous change of behaviour. For mobile payments the tipping point may have arrived – but will there be a dominant solution?

Sprint’s NFC Answer to Isis (Oct. 7, 2013)

When Isis, backed by AT&T Mobility, T-Mobile and Verizon, was announced nearly three years ago, Sprint was notably missing from the group of top U.S. telcos involved in the mobile wallet project.