Adopting Mobile – When, Where & How

(From MasterCard’s “The Heart of Commerce” Blog)

Jennifer Stalzer | May 4, 2011

Yesterday we announced our first-quarter financial results and no doubt one of the first questions was – what do we think about mobile? We’re referring to mobile payments of course, and it’s certainly a hot topic.

Here’s a news article that captures the conversation with our CEO Ajay Banga – it will provide you with our latest thinking on the development of this widely watched and highly anticipated  space.

Here are the highlights:

Obstacles remain

– Several obstacles remain before the technology can become widely used, especially in the world’s developing economies. The mobile payment ecosystem in emerging markets may not develop the same way as it might in more advantaged country that has better terminalization already in place.

Mobile payments will develop in different ways

– Whether mobile payments develop as a contact-based system, or an SMS-based money movement system, or as a true mobile commerce-enabled system, with the rapid deployment of smartphones in the world, it’s likely some version of all three will begin to develop.

Adoption will take time

– There’s a lot of energy being devoted to these technologies and there will continue to be, but it is likely to take some time before it takes off.

(From MasterCard’s “The Heart of Commerce” Blog)