A navigation guide into one of the most complex markets for Digital Money in the world

 

Focus on India Series : Having recently completed our in-market analysis of the emerging payments market in India, I’m confident in saying the country represents one of the world’s most complex, yet promising, battlefields for digital money. India is poised on the brink of a huge economic transformation and making money digital is a crucial part of the solution.

 

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Digital money has a tremendous future in India, and I see a convergence of several factors that combine to create an unstoppable wave. Yet for this country of over a billion people, of which May 2014 World Bank estimates show 179.6 million live below the poverty line, money is going digital in a variety of ways and the savvy providers need to recognise this in order to make their business models work.

 

 

 

India’s Demographic Dividend

Even when services are designed to appeal to the under-banked, providers cannot take their eyes off India’s rapidly growing, massive and youthful middle class. Even if one assumes only 30% of the population of India’s population of 1.2 billion is reachable, this is still a sizable 360 million, considerably larger than the 5.4 million population of Singapore and 7 million of Hong Kong, for instance. By 2015, India’s middle class is expected to be in excess of 267 million. What is more interesting is the trajectory, as the size of the middle class (monthly household income ₹ 20,000-100,000)  was a mere 25 million in 1996.

 

Precipitating Factors

I grew up in India, travelled around the country for the introduction of MICR and worked with RBI, SBI and several banks in India to help computerise different areas of banking, in my early work at Wipro and my own company Visionix. More recently I have personally visited the country to attempt to implement financial services since 2006. It was, to say the least, a test of endurance. However, many recent developments favour payments going non-cash and give me cause to believe that 2015 will be an important year for India.

Firstly, mobile penetration is remarkable and is aided by the September release of budget Android One smartphones that appeal to a highly price-sensitive market.

Secondly, a highly thrifty, large population desperately needs convenient ways to save and spend.

And, last but not least is the will of the government. The recent meeting between Mark Zuckerberg and Prime Minister Narendra Modi highlights the opportunity that digitally connecting remote villages presents to businesses around the world from a wide variety of perspectives.

 

Evidence on the ground

The cash-centric Indian economy is at last moving towards non-cash payments. By end of September 2014 more than 53 million new bank accounts were added in India to disburse benefits and social security to recipients. This is one example of initiatives from the Modi government, strongly backed by the Reserve Bank of India led by Governor Raghuram Rajan.

India’s US$4 billion e-commerce market is set to soar to US$20 billion by 2020.2 E-commerce is being driven by cheap handsets and mobile data plans that enable consumers to buy from their increasingly smart mobile devices.

 

Born Digital Money

As in Africa, mobile money is poised to strongly support financial inclusion goals. But there is more.

In my book “The Digital Money Game” I describe how people expect a whole package of services across online, mobile, social and local situations, creating a multitrillion-dollar industry worldwide. India’s market is a perfect example and consumers are demanding convergent financial services from the start, as opposed to the mobile-centric services that took off in Africa.

This requires, for instance, the ability to provide a service not just using mobile phones but through multiple channels and the ability to offer not just one service but many. Our research this year confirmed that this is needed to compete in emerging markets, and India is a prime example.

 

Reaching previously unreachable markets

Underpinning the non-cash transformation is Aadhaar, the world’s largest biometrics project that goes across all segments of the population. This paves the way for middle-class consumers to make payments to their domestic help, for instance, while also using their new wallets to pay for higher-value airline tickets, goods and services. The rise of mobile Internet access aided by smartphone penetration is bringing young and highly connected shoppers online and is creating conditions for prepaid and digital wallets to thrive.

India’s 1.25 billion people are spread across 29 states and seven union territories and, as a consequence, the complexity of the market has been likened to that of all the European markets put together. Marketing in this highly fragmented environment is challenging due to differences in regulations, income, religion and culture and, notably, the lack of government-issued identification. With just 58% of Indians registered at birth, it’s no wonder that India is the largest user of cash among all emerging countries. With little to no ability to verify their identities, unsurprisingly, just 48% of people have access to bank accounts and traditional payment cards.

 

The emergence of Cash-on-Delivery (COD)

Around 20% of Indians have Internet access, so online sales have only just begun to grow, but the opportunity is immense, particularly as consumers look for ways to digitize cash. So far Indian consumers have not given up their reliance on cash to shop online. Instead, cash-on-delivery (COD)—a uniquely Indian phenomenon—has penetrated many urban markets. This involves consumers ordering online and paying for the goods when they’re delivered, generally at home. Flipkart popularized this convenient way for consumers to shop online with confidence and without plastic cards, and the company has been rewarded with wave after wave of investment.

 

In pursuit of Cash-before-delivery

But launching truly digital money services requires that players connect the dots between the online and mobile worlds and the offline world. As the Indian e-commerce market matures, COD is giving way to CBD (cash-before-delivery). COD has caused some problems for e-commerce merchants because many consumers refuse to accept items on delivery, after the initial flush of an impulse buy has faded. To meet the demand of merchants and to fit into the increasingly mobile-centric consumer lifestyle of Indian consumers, mobile wallets and prepaid payment instruments have flooded the Indian market and challenged the prevailing COD model.

 

Connecting the dots

Our studies show that global e-commerce companies are busily pursuing their strategies to enter this nascent market and rub shoulders with the home-grown services, both categories of players must be mindful of competition from outside their immediate vision.

For e-commerce players, digital money solutions that incorporate CBD will be critical. The race is on between Amazon, Flipkart and Snapdeal. So far Amazon, which recently invested US$2 billion in India, spent this Diwali in hot pursuit of Flipkart consumers. Meanwhile Flipkart shut its payment gateway Payzippy within a year of launch and its recent acquisition, Ngpay, is expected to provide the next platform for its attempt to extend into digital money.

As what we term as a new “nationalised liberalisation” emerges and global players ramp up investment, taking advantage of new ease of doing business in India, Shift Thought offers a range of consulting services, research and portal access that offer timely and vital knowledge on how to navigate the still murky waters of building new brands in India.

 

Shift Thought offers a Navigation Guide

Recently released Shift Thought research explains why and how e-commerce strategies must evolve to compete in the new digital money industry. Our report provides facts and figures not just on the mobile wallet services that have been launched—and the unique way in which prepaid services are taking off—but on the whole set of services we term digital money. I believe that is the game that global providers will need to get right to capture the new opportunities presented by the Indian market.

Our Digital Money in India 2014 Viewport released this month explains how the competitive landscape is unfolding in India, with case studies of how providers are creating unique solutions, and this article is part of our Focus on India Series through which we share highlights of our research.

Whether you are interested in taking up the challenge of entering the market, or simply wanting to know more about what’s happening, just drop us a line today at contact@shiftthought.com and we will be delighted to talk you through some of the key trends that affect you and the various options available through which we can help.

 

Join us to discuss this further and add your valuable comments at my post on LinkedIn

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Some parts of the blog have been published in my blog “India’s E-Commerce Boom Paves Way for Digital Money” on PAYbefore Op-Ed. 

 


Insights on how to succeed in Mobile Money from Gemalto, a world leader in digital security

 

Today I have great pleasure in speaking with Naomi Lurie, Director of Marketing for Mobile Financial Services (MFS) at Gemalto. From this key position at the world’s leader in digital security, Naomi is very well placed to share with us about GMPP (Gemalto’s mobile payments platform) and the work Gemalto is doing around the world in the extremely fast moving payments arena, both in developed and developing countries. Naomi shares with us some of the key initiatives in which Gemalto has been involved, and explains the importance of perseverance in achieving mobile money adoption goals.

 

Naomi could you kindly set the context for us, with a bit background on Gemalto and your leadership position in mobile financial services?

Gemalto OfficeGemalto is a leader in digital security, and a technology enabler for mobile network operators, banks, governments, enterprises and retailers. We work behind the scenes to ensure that each time their customers, employees and citizens want to transact, connect or identify themselves, they can do it safely and easily. You may not realise it, but if you put your hand in your pocket and take out your wallet or mobile phone, chances are it has a Gemalto security component – in your SIM card, your bank card, your driver’s license or your government ID.

One of our important growth areas is mobile payment services, and I look after Marketing for these solutions. Specifically I’m responsible for our Mobile Money and Cloud Based Payments offers. In our Mobile Financial Services marketing team we also offer Trusted Services solutions, including TSM and a Trusted Services Hub business service, and we are NFC experts. It’s exciting work in exciting times, especially as we are a global player with 44 sites and customers in 190 countries.

And with the coming of tokenisation there is yet more work for you?

Yes, certainly. As the leading TSM provider, we’ve been provisioning credit cards onto the mobile device for the largest mobile payments initiatives in the world. Emerging standards for cloud-based payments and tokenization require secure provisioning services for cards, tokens and keys. So, our assets and expertise in provisioning, mobile security, and authentication all come into play.

We’ve recently announced our Trusted Services Hub, a turnkey business service that enables issuers, enterprises, transport operators and digital service providers to easily deploy their value-added and mobile payment services across smartphones and mobile networks around the world. So with one connection to the Hub they gain access to over 1.5 billion mobile users worldwide already covered by our solutions.

Please give us some background on the Gemalto Mobile Payment Platform (GMPP)

GMPP is our comprehensive, field-proven, secure, flexible platform for issuers, mobile operators, retailers and banks that wish to launch mobile payment services. It supports emerging market use cases including stored value accounts, agent networks, P2P transfers, bill payment, airtime top-up, merchant payments, government payments and more. GMPP also powers developed and semi-developed market use cases relating to payments, usually from smartphone devices, such as in-store and online payments, loyalty and couponing.

We work across many different channels: USSD, STK, mobile apps, web and more, and we offer strong security across all these. We authenticate customers and manage risks relating to repudiation, fraud and more. We integrate into mobile operator, issuer and retailer environments and manage diverse requirements based on the nature of the ecosystem, which ranges from simple to very complex.

How has GMPP been used around the world?

Our platform is deployed around the globe. In Europe we work with Telefonica Spain and Telecom Italia.

India Post

India PostThe Gemalto Mobile Payment Platform is running in India with India Post for domestic remittance, since November 2012. India Post’s domestic money transfer service was a traditional paper-based service that took around 5 days to arrive at the destination. India Post wanted to modernise the service, to compete with the new mobile money systems coming from new entrants such as mobile operators. Since India Post has close to 90% of their branches in rural areas, they decided to modernize their money transfer service using mobile. It’s an interesting over-the-counter service. The agents at the post office are equipped with a mobile device that runs an app that collects information about the sender and recipient, amount and pickup location. Immediately both sender and receiver get SMS notifications about the transfer and how to pick it up. And the transfer happens in minutes!

 

Transfer in Mexico

Transfer1In Mexico, the GMPP is at the heart of the Transfer Service, which is brought to market by Banamex (Citi’s Mexican subsidiary), Telcel (America Movil’s Mexican mobile phone subsidiary) and Banco Inbursa. Telcel provides the channels: SMS, USSD and CRM. The banks hold the accounts and create the use cases, as well as manage network integration with Point of Sale and ATM networks. In Transfer users can get a companion card as well, to access the balance in the prepaid stored value account for POS payments. GMPP hosts all transactions and the customer wallet. The service went live in April 2012.

GMPP is also installed with NetOne in Zimbabwe, for their OneWallet mobile money service. This is your classic service, with P2P, cash in, cash out, airtime top-up and bill payment.

Gemalto provides the SIM Toolkit (STK) and Secure Access Gateway for MTN Group in Africa, Vodafone Qatar and elsewhere.

GMPP obviously solves some key needs for the unbanked. Could you please tell us what makes your implementation uniquely compelling?

I think what’s unique is the way we can address a very broad spectrum of use cases in a highly secure manner.

If we rewind to 5 years ago we thought we knew the recipe for mobile money. Just provide the standard set of expected services, follow the formula and deploy. However services have gotten more diverse. There are specific needs and requirements when we deploy in semi-developed markets. And emerging markets also have diverse customers – some with smartphones and others with very basic phones. Take Mexico for instance, the aspiration is to bank the unbanked and offer a new kind of account to the masses, but they must also appeal to urban users. There is a need for a combination of scenarios. We therefore feel well placed as we can offer the limitless combinations, while maintaining security across all the channels. That’s the strength Gemalto has.

Also we build our platforms to scale. We see mobile money as mission-critical services and can affordably scale up and ramp up as the usage grows.

What do you see as some of the challenges faced in bringing services to market?

There is no magic. You can’t just deploy technology and expect the service to be a success. It has to have all the right elements – in go-to-market, organization, and budget. You really must do your homework and take care of buyer personas, marketing strategy and back office support. You need a lot of CXO attention and need to continuously attract investment and management attention.

I think it is really important to be able to correct yourself. Of the over two hundred mobile money deployments, only a few have reached scale. If you give up and just let the offer die down, that is a waste. As in case of any product launch, it’s important to be able to correct yourself.

Another challenge can be regulation, meaning what type of services the regulator allows and what kind of limiting factors will the regulator impose. Often you need a strong lobby on both aspects.

When you look at mobile driven and bank driven initiatives which of these have a better chance of succeeding?

It seems that mobile operators (MNOs) have been more successful, but this is quite dependant on the region. MNOs seem to have the lion’s share of deployments quantitatively, but we do observe a trend for more issuer-led services.

MNOs seem to have an advantage on the marketing side; they know how to market to the unbanked masses, while banks are more comfortable marketing to their traditional clients. To launch a service for the unbanked requires a real transformation for the banks. However, in semi-developed and developed markets where most of the population is banked, the banks are at an advantage.

What are the major changes you’ve seen in the last year?

One change in the emerging market space is the launch of more consortium-led initiatives, and also Central Bank led initiatives. There are some new models coming up along these lines, with an attempt to put the entire set of domestic transactions on a single platform. Within that setup, individual service providers can offer branded services and compete with each other. These types of initiatives aim to address the question of interoperability from day one.

We also observe a much higher interest in enabling payments – in-store and POS payments in addition to mobile P2P between buyer and seller.

What major goals do you look forward to in terms of 2015?

Our goal is to continue to be the trusted partner of our clients and to help them operate successful mobile payment services. We aim to help our clients bring their mobile business strategy to life, while providing all parties confidence in the robustness and security of the service. It promises to be quite an exciting year with the advent of emerging tokenization standards, the new Gemalto Trusted Services Hub, the launch of major new initiatives, and the evolution of existing services.

Naomi thanks for sharing the very interesting work you do around the world and I wish you and Gemalto the very best of success for the future!

 

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Naomi has a proven record of driving product and market excellence for products in the mobile, financial, retail and enterprise sectors.

Naomi joined Gemalto in 2010, where she drives marketing and strategy for the company’s mobile payment and mobile wallet solutions. She is an expert on the mobile money use cases emerging across the globe and is involved in some of the most ambitious and large-scale mCommerce services in both developed and developing markets.

Previously, Naomi was a product manager at Verint, which specializes in enterprise and security intelligence. Naomi was responsible for the global introduction of analytic software solutions for workforce-enterprise optimization, as well as the execution of product launch and rollout plans to sales, support and professional services.

FaceBook, FaceTime ..next stop FacePay?

 

As fraudsters continue to challenge financial service providers around the world, biometrics is starting to offer an alternative – but when will it become truly viable, and part of mainstream payments systems? We look at some developments in biometrics, as the world’s largest biometric system Aadhaar faces its latest setback.

 

imageLast year this time Uniqul Oy from Finland claimed to become the world’s first provider of face recognition payments systems. They believed they could reduce time spent on transactions from an average from an average of around 30 seconds to less than 5 seconds: cameras monitor shoppers from the time they get into the queue, so as to easily charge their account after scanning their shopping.

Unfortunately it expects shoppers to pay. Customers wanting to use the system needed to pay a subscription depending on proximity to the store.  Scandinavia has many “firsts” in payments, and I’m sure the business model will evolve over time. A big step forward in terms of technology, but I expect adoption will prove to be the next hurdle to cross.

A Deloitte survey found that 72% or respondents would welcome the use of biometric identification. Consumers are concerned about mobile device security, yet 63% of smartphone users have interacted with their bank via a mobile app.

Arguably, it is not shops in developed countries with high card usage where the new systems will first take off. As shopping malls take off in India and China, will people move from cash straight to biometrics, and skip the card payment phase?

Last month when I was in India I had the pleasure of revisiting Shoppers Stop in Andheri, Mumbai, and was witness to an interesting exchange. My friend simply gave her mobile number in order for the loyalty points to be added on – she no longer bothers about carrying her store loyalty card!

This seemed to be a straight-forward solution to the problem of managing multiple loyalty cards, but right now it may only be practical in up-market stores where they have the time to indulge an individual customer, without delaying a whole queue. The potential of delivering benefits to the whole shopping experience from face recognition seems to be something that could further drive a new “Face Pay” experience.

But as fewer people visit stores and more take to shopping online and on smartphones, payment by fingerprint has recently grabbed the headlines – first with the release of PayPal’s Samsung S5 fingerprint payment, and shortly after with news that it may already have been hacked.

From the customer perspective, it is always a quandary to allow new data points about themselves to get captured and possibly become the target for thieves. Personal data is powering a great number of new business models. We are currently investigating how regulations are likely to be built so as to be effective in protecting both our privacy and security.  We’ll take a closer look at this, as well as the potential for biometrics in digital channels in subsequent blogs.

Meanwhile it seems from this report that all is not well with the world’s largest biometric project. It continues to face recognition problems, and in particular the big question of who will pay for the equipment required. Read more  at RBI defers Aadhaar-based payment system?

How is biometrics changing the way people pay at a store near you?