Wallet in your phone

Chimwemwe Mwanza Finweek
21 February, 2008


IF MOBILE manufacturers have their way, we'll soon be replacing our wallets with our cellphones. Across Europe, telecoms operators, financial services and retail players keen to encourage impulsive shopping have warmed to the idea of turning cellphones into a substitute for cash and credit cards in a series of trials.

With the high penetration of cellphones throughout Africa and the low penetration of traditional banking services, there are opportunities for African players in the cellular, banking and retail sectors to benefit from those trials.

The technology can be delivered in two ways. Mung-Ki Woo, Orange telecoms group vice-president for payments, says that with near field communication technology an embedded computer chip in a cellphone transforms it into a swipe card that can be waved over a special reader - enabling payments for groceries, accessing public-transportation systems or feeding a parking meter reader.

Some companies are using text messaging and voice-command technology that allows consumers to send payments to others and to buy from retailers - and this doesn't require the cellphone to be in the proximity of a reader.

In France - leading the adoption in Europe - five of that country's major banks, three mobile operators, plus Visa and MasterCard, are lending their expertise in a pilot project in around 200 retail shops in Caen and Strasbourg.


More at: MyBroadband News