Last week’s Mobile World Congress ran the full gamut of mobile money news covering everything from remittance services in the developing world to new payments systems set to launch this year in the US, and ranging from low-tech SMS-based transaction technology to high-end, NFC-based systems. Payments was one of the key themes of the show.

Visa was particularly busy. It announced a major partnership with Vodafone whereby the two companies will offer a Vodafone-branded mobile wallet based on Visa’s existing pre-paid account across the mobile operator’s global footprint.  Separately the credit card giant shook hands on a deal with Orange so that the mobile operator’s customers in emerging markets will have access to the Visa pre-paid account. Also Visa debuted with partner Samsung their mobile payment app for this year’s Olympic and Paralympic games (the announcement actually happened a couple of days ahead of the event).

The credit card firm was not the only financial institution busy in Barcelona. Chase, Capital One and Barclaycard were unveiled by Isis as the first cards inside its mobile wallet which is due to launch later this year in the US. The mobile payment venture was busy in other ways too. CEO Michael Abbott said during a keynote that its partners (AT&T, Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile USA) have made a “significant commitment” to deliver the NFC handsets for its mid-2012 launch. Handset availability has traditionally been seen as a bottleneck for NFC. Likewise rival Google Wallet laid out its future handset plans which include the imminent launch of LG Viper, its first non-Samsung handset.

In contrast was the presence in Barcelona of Viola, a Haitian mobile operator whose service has played a role in the country’s recovery following a devastating earthquake in January 2010. The operator’s simple USSD-based service has become a means to distribute aid payments.

Elsewhere Western Union announced a number of mobile operators with plans to launch its international remittance service to their subscribers.  The company is also expected to announce an own-brand handset for customers in Uganda shortly after congress.  The money transfer firm wants to trade on its familiar brand by giving away distinctive yellow and black handsets for free to 10,000 loyal customers.

Less high profile than many announcements at the show but with a deal of significance was an agreement between Gemalto and Sony to provide FeliCa/NFC services globally. The former is Sony’s contactless smartcard platform over which Japan’s three mobile operators offer wallet services. Just prior to the event, both NXP and Samsung announced interoperability agreements with Felica Networks, which is majority controlled by Sony. Closer alignment between Japan’s mobile payments system and the version of NFC used in the rest of the world is on the cards.

Finally, every existing and potential player in the m-payments industry seemed to be at the show with one exception: Apple of course. In an answer to a question on the likelihood of Apple entering the mobile payments market David Marcus, VP of PayPal Mobile, said  such a move “doesn’t make much sense”. The profitability from financial transactions does not match that from Apple’s consumer electronics devices, he said. Plus the company “does not generally do well” in B2B markets, said Marcus. Whether Apple does have plans in mobile payments will, along with the take-up of NFC, be two key themes to follow in 2012.

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