BWI: Utiba to Partake in Western Union Digital Vendor Program

Press release from Business Wire India
Source: Utiba Pte Ltd.
Wednesday, June 24, 2009 05:47 PM IST (12:17 PM GMT)
Editors: General: Consumer interest; Business: Advertising, PR & marketing, Banking & financial services, Business services, Telecommunications; Technology
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Utiba to Partake in Western Union Digital Vendor Program
Global Suppliers of Mobile Commerce to Join the Bandwagon of Certification Program

Barcelona, Spain, Wednesday, June 24, 2009 -- (Business Wire India) -- Utiba, a leading global supplier of mobile commerce platforms for mobile operators and financial institutions, has been selected to participate in a new Digital Vendor program with The Western Union Company, a global leader in money transfer.

Western Union created the Digital Vendor Program to extend the reach and accessibility of Western Union Money Transfer® services to mobile finance initiatives in Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, and Asia Pacific. Utiba has been providing mobile-phone-based transaction solutions to the industry since 2001. With a customer base spanning across three continents, its products have been part of many pioneering services across the world, right from basic air-time recharge platforms to complex remittance services. Globally Utiba is recognized for its technical prowess at deploying mCommerce solutions and for the vision and dedication of its leadership that has enabled it to play a key role in evolving the nascent mobile finance ecosystem, in many countries in the developing world. Some of the well known installations of Utiba include GCASH in Philippines, Maxis in Malaysia, True in Thailand, and Mobilink in Pakistan.

Mobile money service offerings are successfully deployed on a single-country basis which include three service providers working together in one "mobile finance ecosystem," including mobile network operators, with well-known consumer brands and large mobile subscriber bases; financial institutions, with the legal and regulatory authority to store and hold money; and mobile platform providers (often called m-wallet or m-banking platforms) capable of managing account interaction between the consumer handset, the wireless network and the financial institution.

Justin Ho, Co-CEO, Utiba says "Today in the form U:Market, Utiba boasts of a very mature product lineup and exhaustive knowledge base with respect to creating and deploying mobile finance systems. We have come a long way since our first mobile international remittance platform implementation in 2007 between Philippines and Malaysia. We are proud to bring our experience and expertise in mobile commerce to this program with Western Union."

Justin also adds "Our objective is to enable the subscriber to remit funds to anyone, anywhere knowing only their mobile telephone number."

U:Market is Utiba's complete mobile transaction management platform. U:Market offers a wide variety of services to operators, banks, retail merchants, and remittance agencies helping them extend financial services to their clients over the mobile phone. The platform is capable of a wide array of services from classic electronic top-up for pre-paid customers to enabling international remittances. VAS retail, loyalty points management, utility bill payments, fees payment, funds transfers, loan repayment, retail banking services, retail shopping payment are few of the mCommerce applications that have been successfully deployed over U:Market by service providers all over the world.

About Western Union

The Western Union Company (NYSE: WU) is a leader in global money transfer services. Together with its Vigo and Orlandi Valuta branded money-transfer services, Western Union provides consumers with fast, reliable, and convenient ways to send and receive money around the world, as well as send payments and purchase money orders. It operates through a combined network of more than 379,000 Agent locations in 200 countries and territories. Famous for its pioneering telegraph services, Western Union dates back to 1851. For more information, visit www.westernunion.com.

About Utiba Pte Ltd.

Utiba was founded in 2001 with the objective of creating true mobile commerce ecosystems, where users should be able to remit amounts to anyone anywhere in the world, knowing only their mobile phone number. Utiba products are focused around providing mobile transaction and payment solutions to: - Banks - Mobile Operators - Micro Finance Institutions - Payment Service Providers. Today Utiba's mCommerce enabling products are successfully deployed across 20 countries with more than 15 operators. Utiba vision: Empowering everyone to make Mobile Payments. For details, please visit www.utiba.com.


CONTACT DETAILS
Justin Ho, Co-CEO, Utiba Pte Ltd., justin@utiba.com
Ritesh Andley, Director-Product Marketing, Utiba Pte Ltd., +91 9810973662, ritesh.andley@utiba.com
Joya Ahluwalia, 20:20 MEDIA, +91 (120) 4642020, joya@2020india.com

KEYWORDS
CONSUMER, MARKETING, BANKING, BUSINESS SERVICES, TELECOMMUNICATIONS, TECHNOLOGY

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