Fortumo Takes Mobile Billing to 4th-Largest Consumer Market (Dec. 10, 2013)
Mobile carrier billing company Fortumo today is launching mobile operator billing in Indonesia, the fourth-largest country in the world by population. Approximately 205 million phone owners using Telkomsel, XL Axiata, Indosat and Axis networks now are able to charge purchases for digital content from top app and online developers, such as Rovio, Microsoft and Gameloft, to their mobile phone bills.
Indonesia has three times more mobile phone owners than credit card owners and mobile operator billing already is more popular than credit card billing for online payments, according to today’s announcement. What’s more, the Indonesian digital goods market is estimated to reach US$244 million in 2013, Fortumo said.
With recent launches in China and India, Fortumo, which has offices in Estonia, San Francisco, Beijing and New Delhi, is available for 2.3 billion phone owners in 10 Asia-Pacific countries. Globally, Fortumo provides payments in 80 countries through more than 300 mobile operators. Earlier this year the company, which claims to be the only mobile payment provider with a self-service setup and no monthly fees or minimum volume commitments, announced an infusion from new investors Greycroft Partners and Intel Capital.
In February, Monitise and BlackBerry announced a mobile money pilot in Indonesia, enabling BlackBerry users to access a mobile money account on their smartphones and transfer funds among bank accounts and to other BlackBerry customers signed up for the service, as well as top up their mobile accounts.
