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Motorola enhances mobile commerce offerings in China

Handset manufacturer Motorola Inc. has launched a mobile commerce service for financial and retail merchandising needs in China, the world's largest mobile market.

The service, consisting of a mobile wallet and back-end management platform, has been deployed by Union Mobile Pay, or UMPay, a mobile payments company established by China Mobile Communications Corp., or CMCC, and China UnionPay. This is Motorola's first mobile commerce deployment in China as part of its growing number of mobile commerce initiatives.

"As the global mobile market matures and operators' competition intensifies, mobile carriers are now striving to create new business models by combining the mobile industry with others and accelerating mobile convergence," said T.K. Ng, general manager of global services, home and networks mobility, for Motorola China, Beijing.

"Amongst others, mobile commerce has the biggest potential to help generate substantial profits for mobile carriers," he said. "In China, the mobile wallet market is rapidly evolving.

"There will be huge opportunities in the mobile payment domain, especially when personalized service becomes more and more important."

Motorola is investing heavily in mobile commerce, which it sees as a mass-market service.

"In response to these market trends, Motorola provides a range of comprehensive mcommerce solutions which brings end users unparalleled and rich experiences of speedy and secure transactions from both the far field and near field," Mr. Ng said.

"By leveraging Motorola's highly secure hosting center and system integration expertise that spans IP and wireless technologies, Motorola aims to make mobile commerce a reality," he said.

Motorola is targeting a broad demographic for its mobile commerce services.

"Mobile commerce is now potentially important for a wide range of industries, including telecommunications, IT, finance, retail and the media, as well as for end users," Mr. Ng said. "Motorola's M-Wallet solution has something for everyone.

"It could be global operators looking for new and revenue-generating business models, financial institutions like banks, supermarkets, retail shops, or present users familiar with current mobile technologies," he said.

Motorola's M-Wallet service provides enhanced user interface with secured service.

Motorola sees this platform as an enhancement to existing technologies based on Short Message Service (SMS), Interactive Voice Response (IVR), Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD) and Wireless Application Protocol (WAP).

Consumers can personalize financial needs such as account inquiries, money transfers, bill payments, utility payments and e-ticketing on their mobile phones, which will eliminate the need to go to banks or carry bank cards.

In addition to mobile banking, the platform also provides business-to-consumer services for merchants that include merchant membership cards, electronic couponing and prepaid cards.

In addition to the consumer mobile services for banking and merchandising needs, Motorola's mobile commerce offering also includes a back-end management platform.

The back-end management platform, part of the Motorola's Service Delivery Framework called GAMA -- Global Application Management Architecture -- is interoperable with back-office network elements for OSS/BSS for mobile network operators, financial institutions and merchants.

The M-Wallet service with K-Java technology for UMPay's Mobile Wallet is Motorola's first mobile commerce platform launched in China.

In 2007 UMPay's mobile payment platform reached 50 million registered users.

Besides bill settlements and fund transfers, the M-Wallet solution also lets CMCC's subscribers buy lottery and tickets and participate in mobile games via an interactive interface.

Mobile users only need to download and install the M-Wallet application on their mobile phones that support Java technology and register their banking accounts to the mobile phones via UMPay.

The Motorola Global Services team in Beijing works closely with UMPay to develop user interfaces and create new features for mobile services.

The team also develops and supports the back-end management platform for the mobile network and banking systems.

Motorola's portfolio includes communications infrastructure, enterprise mobility services, digital set-tops, cable modems, mobile devices and Bluetooth accessories.

Motorola posted sales of $36.6 billion in 2007.

Union Mobile Pay is a mobile payments service company aiming to deliver the most secure mobile payment solutions in China since its launch in mid-2003.

Currently, it is the only mobile payment platform with a direct connection to CMCC and covers 14 out of the 16 major banks in China.

The company was brought together by a strategic partnership between CMCC, China's telecom network with a consumer base of 400 million, and China UnionPay, China's largest bank card network association.

UMPay's services include Mobile Wallet, Financial Messaging, Top-up and Mobile Ticketing.

"Motorola started to work with UMPay one-and-a-half years ago," Mr. Ng said. "Both parties share many common goals in the mobile commerce domain.

"By leveraging UMPay's national resources, Motorola can facilitate the mobile commerce development in China, allowing customers to shop or perform bank transitions whenever and wherever they want," he said.

"Moreover, Motorola is able to cultivate subscribers' mobile payment behaviors and continuously optimize its solutions and products with constructive feedback from UMPay's existing subscribers."

Motorola feels like the consumer and enterprise markets are primed for mobile commerce.

"Motorola's mobile payment solution portfolio is not only in line with Global Platform's framework and technology requirements, but also corresponds with the actual needs of China's financial environment," Mr. Ng said. "Thus, Motorola can ensure payment security and is willing to work even closer with telecom operators in the future to provide best user experience in a secure manner.

"The Motorola Global service team in China works closely with UMPay to develop user interfaces and create new features for mobile services," he said. "The team also develops and supports the back-end management platform, ensuring its smooth and reliable operation with the mobile network and banking systems."