‘Building trust is an important exercise for the adoption of m-payments’
What is the current scenario of payment over mobile platform in India, and where do you see the market in the next couple of years?
M-commerce is rapidly gaining ground in India. Gone are the days when ATM and credit cards made the wallets lighter. Now mobile is fast replacing wallet. With the present regulations of RBI, many players are coming up with mobile wallet facilities however, the mobile payment industry is still in its nascence. During the last few months the industry has witnessed the entrance of many players like—banks, telecom operators and handset manufacturers.
How big is this market and at what rate is it growing?
The m-payments scenario holds a lot of opportunities in the Indian market. With 900 mn mobile subscribers (March, 2012) growing at 14% y-o-y and nearly 40% unbanked population in India, m-payments has huge potential in India.
Looking at this potential, the market does not seem to grow at the rate desired. What are the challenges?
While financially integrating the unbanked into formal financial system holds great promise, it is not easy for consumers to see the need for an electronic banking system or trust such a system. Building trust of both the customers and the merchants is an important exercise for the adoption of m-payments.
Beam, like all other players in mobile payments industry, is facing 4 main issues. The first, a regulatory environment that needs to be encouraging and pragmatic; second, ability to create a wide and deep ecosystem; third, finding right people and last but not the least, communicating this novel concept to the masses.
How is Beam Money placed in the value chain and how has been the response for it so far?
Beam is into offering a mobile wallet/mcommerce and a prepaid payment services that is regulated by RBI. Both use mobile device for transactions. Instead of paying with cash, check, or credit cards, a consumer can use a mobile phone to pay for a wide range of products or services using Beam. It offers cashless payment for various services, such as domestic money transfers, banking transactions, utility bill payments, home delivery, shopping, mobile/DTH-TV recharge, travel bookings, e-commerce payments, and movie bookings. Beam has been rolled-out pan-India and with over 50,000+ channel partners and 14 mn+ customers, the response has been over-whelming.
Can you also tell us the value of transaction that’s done through Beam per month and the number of users, on an average, for a specified period?
Beam currently processes over 1 mn transactions on a monthly basis. We have over 14 mn customers as of December 2012. We are growing at 100+% y-o-y.
ritus@cybermedia.co.in