American Express, the US based Banking & financial products company, is in talks with Mukesh Ambani owned Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) to launch a JV in India that will offer financial services, including a payment gateway, according to a report in The Economic Times. The report cites unnamed sources saying that a payment gateway solution is high on RIL's priority list, since it plans to launch broadband services. The spokespersons of both companies have reportedly not commented. Remember that RIL had bought 95% in wireless broadband auction winner Infotel, for Rs 4800 crore. Why - Telecom operators like Airtel, RCOM, Vodafone and Tata Tele etc offer primarily pre-paid services, and payments are automatically deducted from consumer accounts. They typically do not have standardized billing terms and conditions, and the reach of their billing services is limited to a few value added services companies. We've written about this issue before. RIL may be looking to tap a larger, merchant ecosystem, to open up commerce external on mobile and broadband. Remember that this approach appears to be similar to what InMobi is attempting with its SmartPay solution, offering developers alternative billing services. - RIL is planning to launch LTE, which - according to industry rumors - is probably going to serve two functions - as a backhaul for 3G services (since existing mobile operators have limited spectrum), and mobile broadband services. An independent payment gateway solution will give it a broader playing field, taking it beyond just its mobile broadband services. - Why AmEx?…
Please subscribe to MediaNama. Don't share prints and PDFs.
You May Also Like
News
Google has released a Google Travel Trends Report which states that branded budget hotel search queries grew 179% year over year (YOY) in India, in...
Advert
135 job openings in over 60 companies are listed at our free Digital and Mobile Job Board: If you’re looking for a job, or...
News
By Aroon Deep and Aditya Chunduru You’re reading it here first: Twitter has complied with government requests to censor 52 tweets that mostly criticised...
News
Rajesh Kumar* doesn’t have many enemies in life. But, Uber, for which he drives a cab everyday, is starting to look like one, he...