Launch of new Wi-Fi payment s

RNS Number : 4383W

Bango PLC

29 July 2009

 



29 July 2009

BANGO PLC

('Bango' or 'the Company')

Launches new Wi-Fi payment for mobile phone users 

Bango plc (AIM: BGO) the mobile web payments and analytics company, today announces the first Wi-Fi enabled operator billing service for smartphones.  

This new service targets the growing base of smartphone devices, such as Blackberry and iPhone, which often connect to the web through Wi-Fi, bypassing the mobile network operators. The Bango service allows smartphone users to pay for content on their phone bills through the same click-to-pay experience, despite being connected outside of the operator's network. Without Bango's Wi-Fi on-bill payment capability, smartphone users would be redirected to credit card payment processes, leading to lower conversion rates and lost sales for content providers. 

Bango's new Wi-Fi on-bill payment capability delivers up to 25% more sales and enables both operators and content providers to capture revenue from this growing segment of their customer base.

Mike Short, VP of Telefónica Europe, one of the world's largest telecommunications companies commented, 'We have worked hard to make the content buying experience both easy and trusted by opening up our on-bill payment services to our customers.  An increasing proportion of subscribers are choosing Wi-Fi connectivity at home or in specific locations, to augment our 3G connectivity.'  

'This innovation by Bango, one of our accredited payment intermediaries with Payforit, brings the benefits of tried and trusted operator billing to subscribers, even when they connect over Wi-Fi.'

Ray Anderson, CEO of Bango, added, 'At Bango we strive to offer the most advanced technology to promote the best possible mobile web experience. Only Bango has the ability to provide smartphone users with consistent, easy, click-to-pay billing across Wi-Fi and operator connections. This new service gives the highest possible conversion rate for the content provider, resulting in additional revenue from end users.'

Steve Crawford, Operations Director of GoSpoken.com, a leading mobile e-book and audio book company said, 'Over 25% of our customers have a Blackberry or Windows Mobile phone and an increasing number are using Wi-Fi for the faster connection speeds on offer - they can now buy the same way as everyone else. By using Bango to deliver a consistent operator payment experience to all our customers we have seen a marked increase in sales. Conversion rates using operator billing are much higher than using other methods, and easier for our consumers. No other billing solution lets our smartphone customers simply click to pay.'

Gartner research has outlined that the smartphone market represents the fastest growing mobile phone segment, with 38.1 million smartphones sold worldwide in just the first quarter of 2009. 

Contact Details: 

Bango plc	ICIS	Panmure Gordon & Co
Email: [e-mail]	Tel. [phone]	Tel. [phone]
Ray Anderson, CEO	Caroline Evans-Jones	Aubrey Powell
Peter Saxton, CFO	Fiona Conroy	Stuart Gledhill

About Bango 

Bango (AIM: BGO) provides a mobile web payment service that enables businesses of all sizes to collect payment for music, games, applications, videos and services sold to internet connected mobile phone users. Bango's service is able to charge these payments to the consumer's mobile phone bill or use other billing methods such as credit card based on intelligence about the consumer.  

Bango also provides an analytics service for mobile web sites that provides accurate information about visitors and measures the effectiveness of marketing activities.

Visit www.bango.com.

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