The latest mobile technology venture from Singaporean entrepreneur Eric Barbier has raised €2 million in first round funding to expand the service internationally.
The mobile micro payment service Transfer To facilitates the transfer of mobile phone credits across borders, letting users give friends or relatives more calling minutes in their mobile phone account. The funding came from new investor Ingenico Ventures.
By sending text messages to Transfer To, foreign workers can use the service to recharge the prepaid mobile phones of their relatives back home. The cross border business of airtime remittance is estimated to be worth €202 billion a year and features 200 million migrant users.
Transfer To allows workers in countries Brazil, China, Egypt, India, Mexico and Poland to send the equivalent of money in the form of airtime minutes to relatives.
“Thanks to Transfer To, mobile operators, retailers, banks and money transfer companies can offer an innovative and differentiating service to their ethnic segment – an underserved market with a high telecom spending usage,” Barbier said
Barbier is the founder of Mobile 365, which was acquired by Sybase for €286 million in
2006 and now operates as Sybase 365.
2006 and now operates as Sybase 365.