Telefonica Digital pushes direct to bill payment

Over 300 million subscribers will be targeted by a new mobile app store payment service being developed by Telefonica Digital and Bango.
 
The digital innovation arm of Telefonica has partnered with mobile payment specialist Bango to enhance direct to bill payments on app stores by combining the API from Telefonica’s BlueVia developer platform with Bango’s payment platform. The pair plan to pitch the service as a standardized platform for all app stores, and make it available to 314 million customers that use BlueVia.
 
Jose Valles, head of BlueVia, says the Bango partnership will deliver a mobile billing set up with a “global reach and a payment method far broader than credit cards.” That reach “empowers the apps store and content owners to achieve mass scale in their business,” he adds.
 
The firms predict the new payment service will be particularly useful in emerging markets where penetration of bank accounts and credit cards is very low. The platform will be offered to all app stores that can handle operator-billing and other payment methods, which the firms claim will simplify customer payments because they won’t need to enter personal information to make a payment.