Now, I’m the least techno-savvy person I know. All right, apart from my elderly relatives and a guy I saw on the bus last week who was speaking into the wrong end of his mobile phone. It’s pretty hard for me to get excited about nanochips and dynamic scripting languages, but every so often my interest is aroused by something that might actually make a difference to people’s lives.
The other week no fewer than three announcements caught my eye. All concerned mobile banking and payments, and all have the potential to change the way we interact with our financial institutions and online stores.
First, Fronde Anywhere, a New Zealand-based company, last month announced a global marketing push for its two-factor authentication and mobile banking platform solutions. Its BankAnywhere platform allows users to check account balances and transaction history, make funds transfers, and make payments via a secure Java application. This is proven technology that has already been successfully implemented by banks in Fronde’s domestic market, and the solution works with any mobile device or mobile operating system. More importantly, from the banks’ point-of-view, it can be customised to look and feel unique to a particular brand. There are even plans to extend the platform to e-commerce.
Then there’s Gresham Computing, whose Clareti Connect product now has the facility for banks to provide their customers with account information and real-time transaction alerts to PCs and mobiles whenever money is taken from an account. There’s also a nice IM feature that allows customers to contact their bank’s customer service team.
And if all that wasn’t enough, Nick Ogden, the founder of internet payment solutions specialist WorldPay, recently launched a voice-based authentication and processing service called VoicePay. Based on voice-recognition biometrics, VoicePay is designed to offer online retailers a more cost-effective and lower risk payments processing solution. It also offers smaller retailers in particular a foot in the e-commerce door because VoicePay has managed to negotiate cheaper banking fees, making online trading a more affordable option.
All these technologies offer firms opportunities to differentiate themselves and boost their standing with customers. There’s a real opportunity now for banks and retailers to get on board and exploit the ubiquity and power of mobile devices.
