It now supports real-time smartphone based transactions in a growing number of countries.
M-Pesa, the mobile payments platform that was created by Safaricom, has already been providing digital money systems in a number of different countries, particularly in Africa.
It set the standard for the industry in Kenya, since it was first created in 2007 and has a growing user base.
The strength of M-Pesa has come from providing mobile payments options to populations that have been primarily unbanked or under banked. Today, the company is providing these options to over 16 million people in Kenya so that they will have access to financial services on a basic level for the first time. It has also allowed the service to broaden quite rapidly into other marketplaces, such as India and Afghanistan.
A recent mobile payments news report has now announced a new upgraded platform for the service.
The report was published in Business Daily in Kenya and stated that M-Pesa was upgrading the services that it is offering to a new mobile payments platform that will help to keep it a step ahead of many of the other providers who are setting sights on the same markets, as well as some of the leaders in both developed economies and emerging markets.
The new and upgraded platform will provide expanded mobile payments processing capacity for the service and will allow users to be able to complete post paid utility bill transactions, as well as pay their insurance premiums, and complete other forms of transaction in real time.
The migration of the mobile payments service to the new platform is being handled by Huawei, the telecommunications provider from China. It has been estimated that the first phase will be completed before the end of 2013, and that the entire process will take a total of approximately 18 months.
Michael Joseph, a former CEO of Safaricom, explained that as well as mobile payments of bills, the new upgraded platform will also make it possible for the integration of M-Pesa with other types of vendors, including retail outlets. This will make it possible for in-store real time payments to take place at some point in the not too distant future.
Report highlights importance of mobile commerce and other activities on smartphones
Experian Marketing Services, a marking firm associated with Experian plc., has released a new report concerning consumer behavior and the use of smartphones. Mobile technology has come to play a vital role in the lives of the average consumer, with many people relying on smartphones to function in their daily lives. The advent of mobile commerce has made these devices even more important to people around the world, especially as they devices begin to store and make use of financial information.
Consumers spend average of 58 minutes on their mobile device daily
It is no surprise that many consumers have smartphones, but what may be surprising is how much time a typical person will spend on their mobile device every day. The report shows that the average smartphone user devotes 58 minutes of their time to their mobile device. Much of this time is spend on a variety of activities, including mobile commerce and social networking. The report suggests that the typical iPhone user spends an average of 1 hour and 15 minutes on their mobile device daily, whereas the typical Android user spends 49 minutes on their device per day.
Most of this time is spend talking on the phone and texting
Approximately 26% of the time smartphone users spend on their device involves talking to others on the phone, while 20% of this time is spent texting. Some 8% of this time is devoted to mobile games, which have proven quite popular with a wide range of consumers. Mobile commerce also takes up some of a smartphone user’s time, but not as much as texting. While consumers have been quick to embrace mobile commerce, many people have not found enjoyable experiences through their smartphones. Poor experiences have driven some consumers away from mobile commerce, but not all have abandoned the idea.
Mobile commerce appears active among iPhone consumers
The report suggests that iPhone users spend more time on mobile activities than Android users. This could translate into iPhone users being more active in the mobile commerce space, but many mobile commerce platforms are based on the use of NFC technology, which is not supported by Apple devices. There are alternatives to NFC, of course, that have made mobile commerce more accommodating to iPhone users, but these alternatives are not as popular as the conventional NFC-based platforms.
