14 DAY TRIAL // Nowadays, credit card transactions, for example, are as common as it gets, which has made cash transactions lose a lot of ground, being set to lose probably even more as mobile transactions are also becoming increasingly popular. Furthermore, companies developing such technologies are now coming up with new ideas, hoping to institute new mobile payments that would replace whatever is left of the somehow legendary cash payments.
Since we are on the subject, we might as well mention the NFC as well, as it was the leading company in mobile payments technologies. Although very promising at first, it unfortunately turned out to be an immense disappointment. The NFC is now forced to recover the lost ground since it developed so slowly. Moreover, it is said that it cannot come up with any advanced mobile payments solution for yet another six years. The competition has taken over the NFC, with solutions such as SMS, mobile Internet and downloadable mobile applications being all set to deliver great payment solutions.
Speaking of the usefulness and the necessity of mobile payment services, ABI research senior analyst Mark Beccue said as follows: “About half of all purchases made by consumers last year were made with cash. [...] Consumers would in many cases prefer cashless transactions when away from home. So, around the world solutions providers have leveraged SMS, mobile Internet and downloadable mobile applications to enable mobile commerce and payments. ABI Research calculates the potential revenue in 2013 from mobile transactions using these methods at about $18 billion: a significant opportunity for payment processors.”
The actual cash transactions-“centered” services that mobile payments are aimed to attack are taxis and parking fees, plus movies and Internet shopping transactions. As studies have already shown, in all these areas, except for the last one, most payments are already done using credit cards, which, as previously mentioned, has become a convenient thing for most. However, some believe that customers might find it easier to use mobile payments, since researches have concluded that, at the rate things are developing, by 2013, Internet shopping will account for about 75% of all mobile payments, with 15% going to parking, and the remaining 10% being almost evenly split between taxis and movie tickets.
“Companies already seizing this mobile payment opportunity include parking solutions provider Verrus, Bharti Airtel and movie theater operators in India, and notably eBay and Amazon – the world’s largest e-commerce merchants – which have enthusiastically embraced mobile transactions with very comprehensive offerings.” Beccue concludes by saying.