International Mobile Banking Updates - July 23

Over 80 million people in Middle East and Africa will turn to mobile banking by 2017
"Experts predict that mobile banking in the Middle East and Africa will jump from 19,8 million to 82,1 million users by 2017. Over the last five years the developing world has experienced substantial growth in the adoption of mobile technology. Emerging markets offer not only new possibilities for traditional banking but major potential for transformative banking."

BMI Bank launches mobile banking service
"Bahraini retail and commercial banking institution, BMI Bank recently announced the launch of a new service to help enhance its customers experience when interacting with the Bank. mBanking, the Bank's new mobile banking service, will enable customers to carry out most of their regular banking transactions in a convenient, safe and secure environment simply using their smartphones."

China Mobile and China UnionPay present NFC payments service
"Chinese bank card association China UnionPay and China Mobile, a mobile network operator, have rolled out their NFC payments service in over 14 cities, including Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou in the country. Available for Android devices, customers can send and receive mobile payments at participating merchants equipped with UnionPay QuickPass contactless POS terminals with the help of an NFC SIM card and mobile wallet application, as reported by the Nfcworld.com."

New tax sparks fears for the future of Uganda's mobile banking
"The Ugandan government has levied a 10 percent tax on mobile banking transactions, in a move some have criticized as being short-sighted and potentially harmful to the country's expanding mobile money industry. The country's finance ministry hopes to raise $12m from the mobile banking tax, which went into effect in early July. At least some of this money will come from remittances, which, according to finance minister Maria Kiwanuka, amounted to $767m last year. But the vast majority of mobile banking customers live in Uganda, and faced with rising transaction costs, many are starting to rethink the system altogether. This could spell trouble for Uganda's emerging mobile banking industry and the economic potential it represents."

FNB strides towards mobile banking
"FNB says that 10% of its banking clients accessed its website via a smart device over the past year to June 2013, up from 4% previously. The bank went live with its revamped website on Sunday (14 July 2013), aimed at an improved user experience and a responsive design enabling scalability to multiple devices. 'At least 900,000 clients have accessed FNB.co.za via a smart device and 10% of banking clients are accessing via a smart device…and growing. It was only 4% last year,' FNB CEO of Online Banking Lee-Anne van Zyl told BusinessTech."

Malaysia’s New Mobile Banking Platform: Poised for Success
"Bank Negara Malaysia has recently launched a new mobile payment channel called MyMobile through its wholly owned subsidiary Malaysian Economic Clearing Corporation (MyClear). For the kickoff, MyMobile has teamed up with the country’s three largest banks, CIMB, Maybank and Public Bank, as well as the three largest mobile operators, Maxis, Celcom and DiGi, who collectively represent 93 percent of the country’s market."

Paying mobile dividends, digital payments giving banks a run for their money
"Australia's big four make up a cosy oligopoly without any real competition, say the critics. But now cashed up global giants are muscling in to the mobile payment space. The likes of Apple, Google and PayPal are on the offensive giving consumers and merchants plenty of new options to choose from."

Judge dismisses legal action to shut down Safaricom’s M-Shwari service
"An injunction sought by Faulu Kenya, a Kenyan micro-finance provider, to shut down Safaricom’s M-Shwari mobile banking service – pending the outcome of a court case – has been dismissed by a judge according to local press reports. As part of its push to broaden the range of M-Pesa services, Safaricom launched a banking service last November in partnership with the Commercial Bank of Africa (CBA). Dubbed M-Shwari, which runs on the M-Pesa platform, the service offers loans and interest on deposit accounts."

RBC announces RBC Secure Cloud: The first cloud-based mobile payments solution in Canada
"RBC today announced its RBC Secure Cloud mobile payments service (patent-pending). This new technology, a first in Canada, will allow clients to more safely and securely pay for purchases using their mobile devices. Keeping sensitive client data secure with RBC in the cloud, not on the phone, makes RBC Secure Cloud a safer, faster, more flexible solution. RBC will bring RBC Secure Cloud to market by the end of the year with debit and credit on a number of smartphone platforms."

TD thanks customers for eighth straight J.D. Power Award in customer satisfaction
"A leader in responding to customers evolving needs, TD Canada Trust has built a stellar reputation for exceptional customer service and convenience. Building on its commitment to delivering convenience to Canadians, TD Canada Trust has received the highest ranking in customer satisfaction among the Top Five banks for the eighth straight year by the J.D. Power 2013 Canadian Retail Banking Customer Satisfaction Study(SM). TD Canada Trust performs well in all seven factors, including channel activities; account information; facilities; product offerings; fees; financial advisor; and problem resolution."

China Mobile to Buy $5.9 Billion Pudong Bank

"An investment may give the world’s largest phone company by users a platform to offer wireless-banking services to more than 527 million customers in the fastest-growing major economy. The investment would help replenish capital at the Shanghai-based bank after Chinese lenders extended a record 9.59 trillion yuan of credit last year.

'China Mobile has been trying to grow its mobile payment business, and a deal would provide some synergies,' said Alex Lee, who rates the listed China Mobile’s stock 'hold' at Taifook Securities in Hong Kong." >> Continue Reading

Mobile Banking Updates - Feb 15

As Mobile World Congress approaches, let’s look into mobile’s future
"With Mobile World Congress (MWC) almost upon us, the mobile industry is already geared up to set us on a path for the next year. New handsets will be announced and pre-announced, partnerships forged, services and apps unveiled, and future technologies demoed, giving us a pretty good idea of where the next twelve months will take us. But what if we zoomed out quite a bit more and took a bit of a shot in the dark to try to predict the mobile trends for the next decade."

Survey: Users Prefer “Web Brands” Over Carrier Services
"I’ve long said that carriers continually miss the boat in terms of leveraging their position to capitalize on mobile marketing and advertising, and a new survey reinforces my stance even further.

CSS Insight, in its most recent survey, indicates that most consumers ignore the services offered by wireless carriers in favor of more familiar names on the Web. While the research suggests ways for network operators and phone-makers to maximize the uptake of the mobile Web, results indicate that many of these opportunities are being overlooked (again)."

Banks' Eureka Moment on Mobile Services
"Financial companies, discovering that people who bank by phone don't always bank online, are changing how they look at mobile services. Once considered just a component of online banking, mobile services that function independently of PCs are emerging. Banks have realized that mobile phones are a delivery channel in their own right. 'There's a whole group of customers for whom text banking is very attractive, and these are customers whose lives don't revolve around a PC,' said Arah Erickson, Wells Fargo & Co.'s head of retail mobile banking."

Leave The Credit Card, Take The Cell Phone
"Small business owners, listen up: Rachel Wallace, marketing director at Wallace Oil in La Junta, Colo., has a new "big box" killer. (Thought that would get your attention.) Wallace Oil owns and leases six gas stations and a convenience store, and Wallace is always looking for ways to land new customers and keep her existing ones coming back. Last spring The State Bank of La Junta showed her a demonstration of a new mobile payment service powered by Bling Nation."

Samsung unveils Bluetooth 3.0, 802.11n smartphone
"Samsung has taken the wraps off the first phone to be fitted out with its Bada operating system. It also has 802.11n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 3.0. Called the Wave, the handset sports a 3.5in, 800 x 480 OLED touchscreen. While Bada runs behind the scenes, users interact with the third incarnation of Samsung's established TouchWiz UI."

China Mobile begins commercial rollout of mobile contactless payments system
"China Mobile has begun the commercial deployment of mobile contactless payments based on RF SIM technology. The new SIMs, which incorporate both a payments chip and a contactless antenna, are now widely available from China Mobile stores and can be purchased for a one-off fee of ¥150 (US$22 approx). Subscribers can then simply replace their existing SIM with the new RF SIM and instantly begin to use their existing phone to make payments at the point of sale."

Haiti Donations: A Turning Point in Mobile Commerce?
"Only two days after a 7.0-magnitude earthquake leveled the capital city of Port-au-Prince, Haiti, the American Red Cross raised $7 million via text messaging from more than 700,000 wireless customers. Donations poured in from every wireless network, including AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and T-Mobile.

Red Cross' relief efforts in Haiti signaled a turning point in the history of mobile commerce. 'It was a major validation about the possibilities of text and mobile commerce and what we're going to see in the future," says Gartner analyst Jeff Roster.'"

The New Market Player VoiceCash Makes Mobile Banking a Reality
"What’s in a location? It’s a good question when someone sets out to change the way the world banks. In fact if Michael Kramer was talking from a marble clad penthouse in Frankfurt or London it might sound more convincing. But Munich? But after a few minutes of Mr Kramer’s company the unimposing office suddenly becomes one of the reasons that he actually seems to have the potential of changing how a large part of the world banks."

Mobile Banking Updates - Apr 12

SmartyPig, the Social Bank, Goes Mobile
"The current economic downturn is the perfect opportunity for this social banking service to go mobile. I love the design and the smart features that leverage the social networking experience to help people save money. The service promises to make people save money by setting specific goals and help them to get there."

China Mobile Partners with Alipay for Mobile Payments
"China Mobile’s Zhejiang branch agreed (NYSE:CHL) to use Alipay’s online payment service. Alipay is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Alibaba Group (HKG:1688), will provide payment services for all mobile service subscriptions. Most analysts agree that 'the cooperation is the first one China Mobile has entered into with a third-party online payment platform operator, said market observers. China Mobile, once the outrunner in the Chinese telecom market, used to take charge of every lucrative business itself in the past 2G era.'"