Airtel partners with Axis Bank for mobile banking services (India)
India’s leading telecom operator, Bharti Airtel, has entered into a partnership with Axis Bank, enabling customers to carry out basic transactions such as transfer money as well as deposit and withdraw cash via Airtel Money.
As per reports, Bharti Airtel chief executive, India and South Asia, Sanjay Kapoor said that following the recent pan-India launch of Airtel money, they are today excited to collaborate with Axis Bank to further strengthen their m-commerce proposition for customers.
He added that the services will first be offered in Delhi and Mumbai on the sending side, and Bihar and East Uttar Pradesh on the receiving side. Thereafter, these services may be extended to other remittance corridors in the country.
Kapoor also said that according to estimates, nearly 43 per cent of the country’s population does not have bank accounts-the ‘Airtel money Super Account powered by Axis Bank’ acts as a no-frills bank account that comes with remittance capabilities.
Axis Bank MD and CEO Shikha Sharma said that their alliance with Airtel will help the bank to reach out to excluded segments of their population, both in rural and urban centres, with reasonably priced banking and financial services.
M-commerce to overtake e-commerce soon (India)
In an emerging market such as India, mobile broadband is expected to become the prime source of internet access, racing ahead even of e-commerce. Accprding to a report by ET, of the next 300 million Internet users to be added, more than 200 million are expected to be mobile Internet users. The variety of low end smartphones available in the market, beginning at $ 58 will aide in the growth of this phenomenon.
The report highlights other Asian markets where mobile commerce has been making its mark. In Japan, around 20 percent of online commerce is done via the mobile phone; whereas, China has an m-commerce level of 12 percent of the overall 30 percent.
As per the report, the number of mobile only Internet users is expected to be over 50 percent in India by 2015. Of the total e-commerce in 2015 in the country, about 15-20 percent is expected to be transacted via the mobile phone.
M-commerce offers consumers certain advantages such as convenience in placing orders over their mobile phone, enhanced interaction between retailer and purchaser, easy mobile payment options with advanced technolgy functions, amongst others.
Ericsson helps implement mobile ticketing service in Florence (Italy)
Azienda Trasporti dell’Area Fiorentina (ATAF, the public transport authority in Florence, Italy) has launched its Mobile Ticketing service in partnership with Ericsson and mobile operators TIM, Vodafone, Wind and 3 Italia. As per a report by the company, the service allows customers of these operators to buy public transport tickets by text message, charging the cost to their mobile account.
Through this initiative, the Italian operators are strengthening their commitment to Mobile Pay, a platform launched in May 2011 to expand the use of mobile technology as a payment method. ATAF is the first public transport administration in Italy to implement mobile payment services. The system is convenient for passengers because a mobile phone is all they need to make a payment, and the cost is charged to their existing mobile account, so no registration or credit system is necessary.
Mobile ticketing represents a new step toward the mass adoption of m-commerce, a concept that transforms mobile devices into mobile wallets to provide a new method of payment for goods and services. In a study on preferred mobile services conducted by the Politecnico di Milano (Polytechnic University of Milan) in Italy, 65 percent of respondents said they were interested in mobile ticketing.
Ericsson is the world leader in mobile charging and billing, with more than 1.6 billion subscribers using its solutions. Prior to the 2012 Mobile World Congress, held in Barcelona, Spain, Ericsson launched its new extended suite of m-commerce solutions and services, designed to accelerate access and interconnection between the emerging m-commerce ecosystem and the financial world to fast-track the next generation of mobile financial services.
Retailers Struggle with the changing M-Commerce Demands
Consumers round the globe are turning to mobile handsets to purchase everything from gift vouchers to flat-screen TVs and retailers around the world are struggling to keep up with the pace of change.
John Lewis has announced that it is going to launch a mobile-optimized version of its highly successful website. In the U.K., majority of retailers are ahead of the curve in developing mobile websites and apps in order to connect the potential of m-commerce, which technology analyst Ovum expectations will bring in US$41 billion in global revenues by 2014, up from US$7.7 billion in 2007.
According to Scott Seaborn, head of mobile technologies at Ogilvy Group U.K., one of the U.K. High Street retailer estimates that it loses 12% of sales from people who purchase via a mobile channel while still in-store. The boundaries are beginning to blur between using a handset and a laptop. Mobile is becoming so significant in human behavior.
Marks & Spencer and John Lewis, the two most established names on the British High Street, are both taking up m-commerce with devoted mobile sites. Marks & Spencer recently sold two sofas for US$5,200 via mobile.
John Lewis has announced that it was launching a mobile-optimized version of its highly successful website and is looking at app development once the site has been successfully launched.
According to Jonathon Brown, head of online selling at John Lewis, the customers appetite for mobile commerce has grown enormously and the company’s focus is on developing a site with a seamless experience. Mobile is a vital part of the vision to become the leading multi-channel retailer in the UK.
According to Marks & Spencer’s social and mobile commerce development manager, Sienne Veit, the company has chosen not to go for apps because they wanted to reach all of the customers. Every person on the U.K. High Street is the customer, so the company doesn’t expect all of them will have the kind of phone that has an app.
According to a survey conducted by France Telecom’s Orange, U.K. consumers are ahead of their European counterparts, which shows that 40% of them have used m-commerce in the last six months, and 40% are likely to do so in the future. In France, only 28% have used m-commerce in the last six months.
The Internet Advertising Bureau asked retailers what was stopping them from developing their m-commerce capabilities.
According to Jon Maw, the IAB’s head of mobile, in the research, 41% of retailers claimed they will have a mobile presence in the next 12 months, but still 39% think consumers are not ready for mobile. They’re wrong. People are comfortable very quickly with buying on mobile [online grocery store]. According to Ocado, 15% of its sales are made or altered through mobile apps. Consumers are willing to buy stuff on their mobiles as long as the experience is a good one.
Ozura Mobile Chosen as Excite Japan’s First International Distribution Partner
Ozura Mobile, a wholly owned subsidiary of Nextnation Communication and a leading international publisher and developer of mobile entertainment, today announced that it has been chosen as Excite Japan’s first international mobile game distribution partner.
Singapore (PRWEB) August 23, 2006 — Ozura Mobile, a wholly owned subsidiary of Nextnation Communication and a leading international publisher and developer of mobile entertainment, today announced that it has been chosen as Excite Japan’s first international mobile game distribution partner.
Excite Japan, one of Japan’s largest web portals and mobile game providers, is granting Ozura Mobile the distribution rights for its premium mobile game titles. Ozura Mobile plans to make these games available through its extensive network of distribution channels consisting of major mobile operators and distribution partners in Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Indonesia, Philippines, Australia, China, India and the United Kingdom.
“Ozura Mobile has been chosen as the preferred international mobile game distributor due to its well established presence in the global mobile gaming industry,” said Ozura Mobile’s Chief Executive Officer, Lion Peh.
Peh added that Ozura Mobile will be effectively offering more than 150 million mobile subscribers in its network the chance to play some of the most sought after mobile games today.
“This partnership with Excite Japan clearly reflects growing international recognition of Ozura Mobile’s cutting edge technology in the development of mobile gaming platforms. Our mobile gaming platform, FunlogiXâ„¢, is one of the most sought after platforms in the mobile gaming industry as it is highly compatible with games from all over the world ranging from Japanese to Russian origin developed using different development tools,” commented Peh.
He further revealed that over the next 3 years, Ozura Mobile expects a boost in revenue of up to USD20 million from global sales via this partnership.
Informa forecasts mobile gaming sales will generate USD$7.2bn a year worldwide by 2011, growing from the USD$2.4bn sold in 2006. The international provider of specialist information also predicts that Asia Pacific, which dominates mobile games sales, will account for nearly half the industry by 2011.
“The rapid revolution in the mobile gaming market, especially in the Asia Pacific, represents a huge potential for us. We have recently launched Indonesia’s first mobile gaming community with Indosat and we are soon to roll out more of our deployment programs in Thailand, Singapore, Philippines, China and Hong Kong. This will be another win for us in tapping into the substantial global gaming market,” said Peh.
To date, Ozura Mobile has published and aggregated an extensive compendium of games through its distribution network worldwide, representing over 2,000 game titles in over 130 countries. With its propriety gaming platform, FunlogiXâ„¢, Ozura Mobile also provides its state- of- the- art community based mobile gaming technology to mobile operators worldwide.
About Excite Japan Co. Ltd
Excite Japan Co., Ltd is one of the leading Japan-based Internet service provider. The Company has five business segments. The Advertising segment is engaged in the sale of advertising space on its Website to enterprises. The Content Service segment offers community services, music download services, online games and others. The Broadband Service segment provides Internet access services, mainly broadband services to general consumers. The Electronic Commerce (EC) segment is engaged in the sale, auction and shopping of commodities through Internet systems. The Others segment is involved in the development of Internet systems, as well as the management of fan clubs and the provision of services for beauty salon services through Internet. Excite Japan is a subsidiary of Itochu Corporation. Headquartered in Tokyo, the Company has three consolidated subsidiaries and three associated companies.
About Ozura Mobile
Ozura Mobile is a wholly owned subsidiary of Nextnation Communication Berhad and is a leading international developer and publisher for mobile games and game developer engine to carriers, aggregators, mobile phone manufacturers and service providers. The company creates games for the mobile phones based on the J2ME, BREW and Symbian platforms. Ozura Mobile’s games are available all over the world through its distribution network of partners spanning across 130 countries. It is expected that the growth of mobile phones supporting these platforms will exceed one billion units worldwide in 2008.
About Nextnation
Nextnation’ a mobile application service provider’ enables businesses and individuals to access’ connect’ and transact across today’s complex global mobile networks. Its core product MINDCEPâ„¢ Platform is a mobile multimedia communication platform’ facilitating and enabling mobile data transmission worldwide using WAP’ MMS’ SMS and Java technologies. MINDCEPâ„¢ is connected to some of the largest premium messaging networks in the world in order to offer a broad range of services from content distribution to mobile m-commerce and place the company at the forefront of this rapidly growing messaging market. Additional news and information about the company is available at www.nextnationnet.com.
Source- http://www.prweb.com/releases/2006/8/prweb427786.htm
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