Visa now seems to believe that mobile banking is going to become increasingly important for banking the unbanked in developing markets.
The credit card giant has launched a new managed service
that it says will make it easy and cost-efficient for
financial institutions and mobile operators to offer mobile financial services
to consumers.
Mobile Network Operators, banks and micro-lending institutions
will be able to launch their own mobile money services on top of the Visa
platform.
Visa will host and fully manage all
aspects of a mobile money program on behalf of the provider, from user interface
design to consumer enrollment, transactions processing, authorization, clearing
and settlement.
The new service can enable domestic-only
or globally interoperable mobile money services.
The new platform, which is being hosted
in Visa managed data centers, is built on Fundamo's technology, the mobile
money technology acquired by Visa in 2011. Visa claims the service is
the “world’s first bank-grade managed service for mobile money”.
Unbanked consumers in India
and Rwanda are
the first to use the service. Aircel mobile subscribers in India
and customers of Bank of Kigali and Urwego Opportunity Bank
in Rwanda now
have access to a financial account that is linked to their mobile phone number.
From cash-in and -out transactions at agent locations, to paying bills, sending
money to relatives, topping-up air time and buying train tickets.
