Airtel India Launches Range of M-Commerce Services

Indian GSM operator, Airtel has announced the launch of a whole range of M-Commerce solutions such as Mobile Money Transfer (MMT), Postpaid Bill Payment and Prepaid Recharge on the mobile phone. It is partnering with ICICI bank, HDFC bank, SBI, Corporation bank and VISA to enable these payments, and the solution has been developed by mChek, a provider of mobile security and payment solutions.

Airtel has piloted these products across the country and already has 67,000 registered customers for Postpaid bill payments with over a hundred thousand transactions. In addition over 17,000 movie tickets have been bought using this service.

Gopal Vittal, Director Marketing & Communications, Airtel, said, "We see tremendous growth potential for these and many more M-Commerce solutions on the mobile phone in the next few years. Our partnership and alliance led innovation approach that we have consistently followed has allowed us to build a solid ecosystem of banking and solution providers to be first off the block in this very relevant space"

All Airtel mobile customers with credit/debit cards with ICICI bank, HDFC bank, SBI, Corporation bank & VISA, can now pay their Postpaid bills instantly. Further, Mobile Money transfer will empower an Airtel user to transfer money to their family or friends by a click of a button. This spells huge convenience to the customer and has the potential to redefine the benefit of a mobile phone from simply being a device for communication to being a mobile payments device.

Posted to the site on 4th March 2008