Singapore Telecommunications (SingTel) aims to be a leading mobile commerce hub in the Asia Pacific region in five years. As a first step to fulfilling this vision, it has opened a remittance centre in Lucky Plaza and the company will launch a mobile-to-mobile remittance service at the end of this year. It will also progressively launch a range of consumer mobile commerce services throughout the year that will complement its existing Near Field Communications (NFC) contactless mobile payment services.
SingTel's mobile remittance service, named mRemit, will allow consumers to use their mobile phones to remit funds to an overseas recipient's mobile wallet account. The sending and receiving parties will both be notified by SMS once transactions have been successfully completed. At launch, customers will be able to remit funds to the Philippines, in collaboration with GCash, the mobile commerce service offered by SingTel's regional associate, Globe Telecom. SingTel plans to extend the service quickly to countries in which the SingTel group affiliates operate, and where remittance services are in high demand.
SingTel will also progressively launch a suite of mobile payment services this year. For example, remote payment services which use the stored value wallet to pay utility bills, fines and parking fees, as well as other services. The operator will also extend its NFC services beyond ez-link retail payments and offer services that support credit card payments, reward programmes, redemption of merchant coupons and deals, mobile ticketing and advertising, as well as public transport.
