Swedish mobile payments company iZettle has expanded into Mexico following a 5m ($6.6m) investment from Banco Santander to make credit card acceptance possible for small businesses throughout Europe.
Since its launch in 2011, iZettle has only been available in several European countries which include, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, the UK, Germany and Spain. Mexico is its first expansion into the Americas.
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Jacob de Geer, co-founder and chief executive of iZettle, said: "Shifting from local to global operations in financial services in less than three years of operation is a major accomplishment from our perspective."
Banco Santander said it’s the largest financial group in Spain and Latin America, but also has significant positions in the UK, Portugal, Germany, Poland and the northeast of the US.
Deputy general director of payment systems at Banco Santander Mexico, Jorge Alfaro Lara, said: "This partnership extends our offering of payment methods available on Banco Santander’s platform globally, and strengthens our position as the leading bank for SMEs. We are pushing the boundaries of banking with relevant technological innovation that helps small and medium businesses."
Ricardo Ibarria, senior vice president and regional head of acceptance for Latin America and the Caribbean at MasterCard, said: "Mexico has a great potential for growth in terms of card acceptance and the increasing use of smartphones is a great opportunity to expand the number of businesses that accept card payments, which is aligned with our vision of a World Beyond Cash"
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By GlobalDataMasterCard co-invested in iZettle when it was preparing to launch in Europe last June.
To coincide with the launch in Mexico, iZettle has released a mini Chip and Magstripe card reader that will allow small businesses to accept chip card and magnetic stripe card payments. It can be used with Apple or Android phones and tablets.
The iZettle app for accepting card payments is available to download in Mexico from the Apple store or Google Play.
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