It started by offering the ability to send targeted messages to opted-in subscribers. Last week, it added similarly targeted display ads.
Now comes the payment part.
With this MasterCard partnership, Weve will give subscribers with an NFC phone the ability to store a wallet in their NFC SIM. This will be accessed via a wallet app supplied by the user’s bank.
They can then make a payment at any of the 300,000 contactless readers in the UK.
Both parties reckon this will speed up the rollout of mobile NFC payment, which has been patchy to date.
Indeed, Orange’s QuickTap is the only service of note, and that’s made barely any impact.
Of course, the big win for Weve is the ability to link pushed messages to the wallet, so that consumers can sign up for offers and redeem them too.
“MasterCard’s vision of a world beyond cash maps neatly onto our own vision of a world powered by mobile”, said David Sear, Weve CEO.
“It allows the banks to focus on what they’re good at – finding smarter and more elegant ways for their customers to pay for goo
Questions remain such as:
* iPhone
* branding of the wallet
* how to actually get the wallet into the phone
We’ll have more soon…