According to Emirates Business24/7, the companies such as Gemalto, Fundamo, mBlox and the Western Union are keen on tying up with the mobile service providers to cash in on the new market. The primary focus of these companies would be to extend services along with the GCC member states to countries including India, Pakistan, Malaysia, Indonesia, Yemen, Iran, Afghanistan and Syria, and some countries in Africa and Latin America.

Gemalto, one of the largest in the mobile payments solutions segment, is already working with du and etisalat. Pascal Oromi, VP for mobile financial services at Gemalto said currently, one third of Gemalto’s revenue came from the Middle East, and was expected to grow significantly in 2010.

Likewise, Fundamo, another player in this space who was unsuccessful at previous occasions for tenders in the UAE is understood to be positive on another shy. Richard Bailey, Product Manager at Fundamo pointed out that mobile money provided a ready access to migrants who still did not have access to traditional banking services by offering banks an opportunity to reach out to the unbanked.

As per latest reports, the Western Union has roped in Comviva Technologies, one of India’s largest providers of VAS to mobile operators to its Mobile Vendor Program for servicing mobile finance initiatives across the globe. Khalid Fellahi, Senior VP, Mobile Transaction Services of the Western Union, informed the technology had been a success in Kenya and Philippines, and an announcement on its mobile wallet plans in the Middle East was awaited soon.

Whereas, Andrew Bud, Executive Chairman at Sweden based mBlox said the high mobile penetration and also lack of banking infrastructure in some areas make it a top area for mBlox. The company plans to operate from Mumbai in India to cater the needs of the Middle East.

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Atom Technologies, the company from India that is behind the invention of software which can duplicate the function of a credit card in mobiles claims that the software is capable of burning the user’s credit card data to a mobile phone. The data would be stored in a 2D barcode format and cannot be read even by the user, thereby secures the handset from misuse in an event it is lost or stolen. Besides, authentication in the form of PIN number is required for payment order. The mobile credit card payment or ‘optical payment’ as termed by its inventors, can be used at any business center which accepts credit cards, and has the requisite software with a webcam that could read the 2D barcode.

It is also loaded with another payment mode called remote location or over the air authentication, by which the user can use the cards sitting at home or office. In this case, the merchant establishment and the bank are connected over the air and the user will have to authenticate and approve the purchase. Currently, the system will work only on Java-enabled phones. Though the company would be levying a percentage of the transactions as its fee, the software will be provided without any additional cost to the commercial establishments including Banks, shopping malls, hospitals, etc.

In addition to the above technology, there are already two players who mimic the functions of the credit/debit card over an SMS, they are mChek and Paymate. mChek has already been conferred with the prestigious Global Mobile Award for the most innovative application during the recent GSM World Congress held in Barcelona in February, 2008.

Both provide services akin to that of a credit/debit card by storing details on a secure server, and once one is registered, one is issued a PIN number. This e-wallet has security features what one gets on an ATM, if one were to enter the wrong PIN three times, one’s account gets blocked, besides that, transaction limit is also enabled on the phone. Major benefit of such an e-wallet is they thoroughly eliminate the number of plastic cards one carries around.

These latest innovations in mobile phone technology are also offering services including money transfer, mobile remittance, bank check clearance, ticket reservation, etc. All these mobile phone technologies indicate that one’s phone is not only just an entertainment and navigation tool anymore but also an e-wallet.

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