Bango and Telefónica Digital announce that they have signed a Global Framework Agreement. The two companies will partner globally to create an enhanced direct-to-bill payment experience for mobile app stores. The partnership will combine Bango’s frictionless payment experience with Telefónica’s BlueVia Payment APIs, connecting over 314 million chargeable customers worldwide to the Bango Payments Platform.
The ability to pay for digital goods and services via a mobile phone bill or prepay credit is a key way for content owners and developers to fully monetize their products. This is especially the case in developing markets, such as Latin America, where penetration of bank accounts and credit cards is very low. Trials of direct to bill in Telefónica operating businesses have proven its ability to drive sales.
Speaking for Telefónica Digital, Jose Valles, Head of BlueVia, said: “At the heart of every great service is first class customer experience and both Bango and BlueVia share the vision that mobile payments must be seamless and low friction for the customer. Through this partnership, we are delivering a mobile billing ecosystem that empowers the app store and content owners to achieve mass scale in their business through global reach and a payment method far broader than credit cards.”
By integrating the single BlueVia billing API into the Bango Payments Platform app stores will benefit from Bango’s user experience for mobile devices, which generates higher payment conversion rates, especially from Wi-Fi-connected and other “off-network” devices. This is particularly important for the future of mobile payments as more than half of smartphones browsing app stores use Wi-Fi connections.
Telefónica is rolling out direct to bill capabilities in its operating businesses and earlier this year announced global, framework agreements with Facebook, Google, Microsoft and RIM.
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