Payments technology
continued to develop very quickly in 2010 and a great many
companies
launched new and exciting products into the market. Louise Naughton
looks at a few of the most impressive products to hit the market
over the last 12 months.
Go deeper with GlobalData
Among the many interesting
and innovative products to reach market in 2010, a few stood out
for us at EPI. Many within the industry are
confident the next 12 months will be the year that mobile payments
really take off and contactless truly gains widespread acceptance
among consumers.
As such it is no surprise that this year has seen
significant activity in these areas as the industry steps up a
gear.
Mobile payments:
CardEase Mobile
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By GlobalData
Payment services provider CreditCall launched
CardEase Mobile this year – a payment application allowing the
world’s first chip and PIN or magnetic-stripe transactions to take
place on smartphones.
The card is read and the
user’s PIN entered on a separate Bluetooth-linked PIN Pad that can
be paired to the smartphone.
With more SMEs turning to
smartphones to conduct transactions, CardEase Mobile is well placed
to take advantage of this trend.
The BlackBerry app launched
in the Autumn of this year but it is not all plain sailing for the
PSP company.
Peter Turner, CEO of
CreditCall told EPI in September that migrating the
technology onto the iPhone is proving difficult but hopes to launch
in the New Year.
What they
say…
Peter Alcock, marketing
director for CreditCall, speaks of his hopes for CardEase Mobile’s
success in the coming year.
Looking back on
2010: “CardEase Mobile is on schedule and the BlackBerry
version will commence live field trials early in the New
Year.
“It is currently in acquirer
testing with UK banks and the first certifications are expected by
the end of 2010.”
Looking forward to
2011: “We are hopeful for CardEase’s success in 2011 as
CardEase Mobile was the only card acceptance solution for
BlackBerry to be shown at the recent Cartes show and generated huge
interest among delegates from EMV countries.”
Contactless prepaid:
The ALTER kART
This year Polish festival organisers Alter Art decided to
see if they could change the way partygoers spent there money at
their summer. Step up e-payments solutions provider FIS, which
teamed up with Poland’s Bank Zachodni to develop a contactless,
prepaid card specifically for the 2010 Heineken Open’er
festival.
The ALTER kART card sought to
offer a convenient payment system for the festival, as well as
reduce the risk of theft. And its impact has been felt beyond the
Polish festival scene. It claims to have driven contactless
transactions in Poland as a whole to dizzying heights and by
targeting the youth market, it says it the product has stimulated
interest in the technology across the country.
What they
say…
Ian Benn, managing
director, FIS Payment Solutions EMEA, spoke of the card’s success
this year and what the future holds for its role in contactless
technology’s development.
Looking back on
2010: “Designing and implementing contactless prepaid card
processing for Open’er 2010 was an exciting project.
This single event saw four
times as many contactless transactions as the whole of Poland
normally makes in an entire year. It proved to be a great
opportunity for Bank Zachodni and FIS to introduce this technology
to thousands of people right in the prime target market.
“With so many transactions
taking place in such a short time period, scalability and
reliability were crucial and throughout the festival, the system
never skipped a beat.
“By the end of 2010 Bank
Zachodni and FIS had supported not just Heineken Open’er, but also
two other major festivals: The Selector, and The Coke
Festival.”
Looking forward to
2011: “A primary driver for this project was to raise the
profile of contactless cards throughout Poland, especially among
retailers.
Bank Zachodni is now at the
forefront of contactless technology in Poland and, by teaming with
FIS to stay focused on innovation, it expects to continue to grow
its lead. For 2011 we will start to explore the huge opportunities
presented by payments through mobile phones and other
devices.”
Mobile banking: Nokia
Money
Nokia became involved in mobile money in August 2009 when
it launched ‘Nokia Money’ designed to offer basic financial
management and payments from a mobile phone.
February 2010 saw Nokia’s
mobile money services piloted in Pune, one of the largest
metropolitan areas in India, in partnership with India’s YES
Bank.
The mobile platform was
designed by m-payments provider Obopay, a company that Nokia
invested heavily in last year, and allows Indian consumers to
transfer money P2P, pay utility bills and top-up SIM
cards.
Nokia also announced the
acquisition of Obopay India in November .
What they
say…
A Nokia spokesperson
discusses its m-payments services.
Looking back on
2010: “Nokia has introduced its mobile financial service
Nokia Money, which has started to roll out in India.
“The service is bringing
consumers access to basic financial services that they had limited
or no access to before, all from their familiar and trusted mobile
device.
“Nokia Money offers a wide
spectrum of mobile payment services, encompassing all consumer
needs: sending money to family and friends and paying bills
whenever and wherever – even if they do not have an existing bank
account.”
Looking forward to
2011: “Mobile-enabled financial services is a market with
long term growth potential.
“In many countries, mobile
phone ownership penetration is far higher than bank account usage,
suggesting that many mobile phone users have no access to basic
financial services.
“At a global level, on a
planet with 6bn people, there are 4.6bn mobile phone subscriptions,
but only 1.8bn bank accounts.
“Mobile payments will be the next step for delivering
financial services to hundreds ofms of unbanked people or those who
are currently underserved, in both urban and rural areas,
especially in emerging economies.”
Voice activated
transactions: VoicePay
Nokia became
involved in mobile money in August 2009 when it launched ‘Nokia
Money’ designed to offer basic financial management and payments
from a mobile phone.
February 2010 saw Nokia’s mobile
money services piloted in Pune, one of the largest metropolitan
areas in India, in partnership with India’s YES Bank.
The mobile platform was designed by
m-payments provider Obopay, a company that Nokia invested heavily
in last year, and allows Indian consumers to transfer money P2P,
pay utility bills and top-up SIM cards.
Nokia also announced the
acquisition of Obopay India in November .
What they say…
A Nokia spokesperson discusses
its m-payments services.
Looking back on
2010: “Nokia has introduced its mobile financial service
Nokia Money, which has started to roll out in India.
“The service is bringing consumers
access to basic financial services that they had limited or no
access to before, all from their familiar and trusted mobile
device.
“Nokia Money offers a wide spectrum
of mobile payment services, encompassing all consumer needs:
sending money to family and friends and paying bills whenever and
wherever – even if they do not have an existing bank account.”
Looking forward to
2011: “Mobile-enabled financial services is a market with
long term growth potential.
“In many countries, mobile phone
ownership penetration is far higher than bank account usage,
suggesting that many mobile phone users have no access to basic
financial services.
“At a global level, on a planet
with 6bn people, there are 4.6bn mobile phone subscriptions, but
only 1.8bn bank accounts.
“Mobile payments will be the next step for delivering financial
services to hundreds ofms of unbanked people or those who are
currently underserved, in both urban and rural areas, especially in
emerging economies.”
Voice activated
transactions: VoicePay
In April this year financial services group Voice
Commerce launched the VoicePay system, which uses the customer’s
voice as a means of digitally signing and authorising
payments.
Touted as a world first for
the payments industry, the technology incorporates specialist
payment provider VoiceVault’s voice verification platform. 2010 saw
a strong start for the innovative product.
The number of small and
medium businesses trading on Voice Commerce’s Voice Transact
platform increased by 73% in the first quarter of the year. On that
basis Voice Commerce made an ambitious projection of an increase in
its merchant base by more than 150% per quarter in 2010.
The technology also led to
the creation of the KYC (Know Your Customer) database, which
launched this month, again claiming to be the first of its kind.
The database aims to provide any company or financial institution
with the means to verify a customer’s identity based on their
biometric Voice Signature.
What they
say…
Nick Ogden, CEO of Voice
Commerce takes a look back over VoicePay’s success in the
market.
Looking back on
2010: “Throughout 2010 VoicePay has continued to mature
into a full e-money solution for mobile phone operators worldwide.
This has subsequently led to the launch of KYC Secure, a federated
database developed to secure and authenticate a consumer’s identity
over their mobile phone.
“The database is directly
linked to the VoicePay account opening system, enabling
organisations that are already working with the VoicePay platform
to rapidly deploy e-money solutions.”
Looking forward to
2011: “We should see more retailers adopting VoicePay as
one of their preferred methods of payments in 2011, as merchant
rate charges are lower than existing e-commerce
transactions.”
Honourable mention:
Faster payments
The Faster Payments service, developed by specialist
payments provider VocaLink, was launched in 2008 and while 2010 has
not seen a great deal of product development, it has seen another
year of impressive growth in the market.
The increasing gap in the
payments market left by the continuing demise of cheques appears to
be being filled very effectively by Faster Payments. The UK
Payments Council revealed the use of the system was up 67% in the
second quarter of this year.
What they
say…
Nick Senechal, strategic
business development manager VocaLink, shares his thoughts on a
busy year.
Looking back on
2010: “May 2010 saw the second anniversary of the UK’s
Faster Payment Service, which enables payments between accounts in
near real-time.
“The year was an important
milestone; 13 banks have now committed to the service, half of all
regular standing orders have migrated and over 10m one-off payments
are made using the service every month. These figures reflect UK
Payments Council research showing a 67 per cent increase in the use
of Faster Payments in 2010. As more and more people are making
payments online this is a trend we expect to see continue in
2011.”
Looking forward to
2011: “With Faster Payments having been progressively
adopted as a new payments standard in the UK over the past two
years, 2011 will see banks looking to enable Faster Payments
through mobile phones.
“Outside the UK, a number of
countries have seen mobile payments as the driver for implementing
a Faster or ‘Immediate’ Payments infrastructure. This was one of
the findings of The Voice of the Consumer research
conducted by VocaLink in the autumn of 2010, which also found that
a third of respondents would be happy to pay a fee per transaction
for the convenience of mobile immediate payments.
The Faster Payments service, developed by specialist
payments provider VocaLink, was launched in 2008 and while 2010 has
not seen a great deal of product development, it has seen another
year of impressive growth in the market.
The increasing gap in the
payments market left by the continuing demise of cheques appears to
be being filled very effectively by Faster Payments. The UK
Payments Council revealed the use of the system was up 67% in the
second quarter of this year.
What they
say…
Nick Senechal, strategic
business development manager VocaLink, shares his thoughts on a
busy year.
Looking back on
2010: “May 2010 saw the second anniversary of the UK’s
Faster Payment Service, which enables payments between accounts in
near real-time.
“The year was an important
milestone; 13 banks have now committed to the service, half of all
regular standing orders have migrated and over 10m one-off payments
are made using the service every month. These figures reflect UK
Payments Council research showing a 67 per cent increase in the use
of Faster Payments in 2010. As more and more people are making
payments online this is a trend we expect to see continue in
2011.”
Looking forward to
2011: “With Faster Payments having been progressively
adopted as a new payments standard in the UK over the past two
years, 2011 will see banks looking to enable Faster Payments
through mobile phones.
“Outside the UK, a number of
countries have seen mobile payments as the driver for implementing
a Faster or ‘Immediate’ Payments infrastructure. This was one of
the findings of The Voice of the Consumer research
conducted by VocaLink in the autumn of 2010, which also found that
a third of respondents would be happy to pay a fee per transaction
for the convenience of mobile immediate payments.
