Mobile Commerce revving up in India

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Mobile internet and Mobile commerce makes a lot of sense in the context of Indian market. There are more than 100 Million people equipped with a mobile phone. But there are only around 40 Million people actively using internet. Mostly because of the lack of internet access services. Most users do not have internet access at home and their primary place of internet access is either office or internet cafes. While access in office is restricted both interms of sites and work hours, accessing internet from cafes is totally insecure. So, many hesitate to buy stuff on internet.

Mobile internet and Mobile commerce offers a solution that is a blessing in a situation like that. With Mobile internet, You can access internet any where, any time right from your mobile and it is very secure.  And Mobile commerce solutions like M-Wallet makes it much more safe and easy to do shopping, because you do not have to enter Credit card information every time you make a purchase.

Keeping the importance of Mobile Internet in that context, its a reason for celebration that Mobile Commerce solutions are revving up in India and recently also got a boost with Industry backing and Venture funding. The two prominent solutions in news recently are JiGrahak's NGPay  and   PayMate. In this post, we will cover NGPay and cover PayMate in an upcoming post.

What is NGPay: JiGrahak's NGPay is a free Mobile Wallet service that enable users to make payments via their cell phones in a secured way. Users enter their credit card information only once during the setup. Then, Users can buy products like airline tickets, movie tickets, flowers, books etc from Merchants partnering with NGPay platform, without entering credit card information again. Also, each user will have a secure PIN that must be entered to proceed with the transaction. Payment is automatically made from your Wallet, through your credit card. You can top up your NGPay account with any credit card. Debit card support is on the way.

Air Deccan and Sify Mall are the first partners of this platform at the time of writing. Pretty soon, you can also pay your friends or communities using NGPay. Regarding venture funds, JiGrahak also received a $2.2 million funding from Helion Venture Partners recently.

What you need: All you need is a Java enabled Mobile Phone with service that enables you to access internet, like GPRS connection. Around 150 models support Java and are capable of GPRS connections.

How to Start: Send an SMS message with 'NGPAY DND' to +91 9945444000 OR logon to www.ngpay.com from your mobile phone browser to download NGPay.   

How to Access the service: Switch on your mobile. Go to Air Deccan or Sify Mall and shop what you want. Pay with your NGPay wallet (additionally you can pay with credit card also). Watch for a demo from the links below to get an idea.

For more information visit the following links:

    Thanks for visiting ‘The Cellular Life Style’. We hope you will enjoy reading it and get relevant information that you can use to your advantage, to have more fun and to enjoy your mobile life style.

Comments

Jayesh said…
I would like update on this thread.
March 21, 2007 at 1:28 AM
Jayesh said…
When you say that mobile payment is secure, is it really secure ?

On ecommerce part, even though payment gateway are claiming themselves secure but lots of time it becomes insecure since user system is not secure from viruses, trozons or spyware.

So do not you think that the same kind of situation will also happen with mobile ? mobile virus is being spreading now. So how can I or one make a secure transaction using these payment services and mobile.

Second comment :
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There is lack of knowledge of mobile software in common man. Now I need to download paymate or ngpay software in my mobile ? how to do it ? i myself do not know. Computer softwares are very common but mobile software are not as common as computer softwares.
March 21, 2007 at 1:33 AM
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