Mobile payments firm gains momentum through Series B funding

Mobile payments firm Flint has managed to fly below the radar through much of this year, but the company has begun attracting significant attention as it makes progress with its mobile commerce endeavors. The firm recently announced support for the Android platform in order to expand the reach of its mobile payments services. This week, Flint announced that it has raised more than $6 million in Series B funding, led by the Digicel Group and SVG Partners. Funding from the Digicel Group may provide some insight on the future of Flint.

Digicel leads Series B funding for Flint

The Digicel Group is not a well known name in the U.S., but is quite prominent in the Caribbean and the South Pacific. The organization operates within the mobile sector and has a strong interest in mobile payments and providing wireless services to consumers. The Digicel Group has, to some extent, become a popular alternative to more conventional telecommunications companies. Both Flint and Digicel share a lot in common, as both companies look to bring new life to the mobile space.

Flint aims to make mobile payments easier for merchants

Flint was launched in May of 2012 and aims to make it easier for new entrepreneurs to enter into the mobile space and embrace mobile payments. The firm offers services that allow businesses to process mobile payments in a convenient manner and without the need for a dedicated point-of-sale system. Using the Flint application, merchants can scan a consumer’s credit or debit card and process a payment quickly, using a fingerprint to authorize transactions. Flint also offers competitive rates when compared to services offered by similar companies.

Funds will help company expand

The funding that Flint has risen will help the company to improve its various mobile payments technologies. It will also help the company expand its team of developers, which is currently 16 people strong. Much of the company’s future plans are kept secretive, however, which may be a good thing considering the aggressive competition that is common in the mobile payments sector.

The company behind the tremendously popular Firefox has started an experimental pilot project.

Mozilla has just announced that it has launched an experimental pilot project called the Mozilla Location Service, which provides geolocation lookups that are based on data from Wi-Fi access points and publicly observable cell towers.

This concept behind the service is that it croudsources and collects this information through mobile.

The idea is that by way of public hotspots for Wi-Fi, and through cell phone towers, the service crowdsources and collects geolocation information to make it possible for smartphones that have weak GPS signals and laptops that don’t have that technology to be able to rapidly pinpoin their approximate location. As of yet, it has not been made entirely clear how it will be possible for the devices to be able to identify themselves, but there are two APIs being offered for the integration of this service into applications.

The geolocation service remains in its earlier stages, but it is progressing quickly.

In order to take part in this service and contribute to its data, users can add the dedicated Android MozStumbler app from Mozilla into their devices. That app is behind the data collection, but it also has a gamified element that gives users the opportunity to enjoy the experience. In this game, they can either contribute anonymously, or they can compete against others on the leaderboard. According to Mozilla, the service is already experiencing a rapid evolution, but that there will soon be a more full featured experience that will be available to device users.

That said, Mozilla has said that it is nowhere near its final stage. This geolocation service remains in the earliest levels and provides only the most basic levels of coverage within select locations due to the generosity of the earlier contributors and adopters of the service. At the same time, the company is committed to ensuring that the privacy elements of the service are improved to a meaningful degree for all of its participants, so that users can be certain that even as they offer the data surrounding heir location, their own privacy remains safe and secure.