Mobile bid
Online marketplace eBay has announced it will acquire Zong - which specialises in allowing payments to be made on mobile phones via operator phone bills - for $240 million in cash.
Zong is an international company that has business relationships with over 250 operators around the world. The company is set to be combined with PayPal in order to strengthen the electronic payment platform's position in the booming mobile commerce market.
"Commerce is changing. With mobile phones, we walk around with a mall in our pockets. PayPal helps to make money work better for customers in this new commerce reality - no matter how they want to pay or what device they're using," said Scott Thompson, president of PayPal. "We believe that Zong will strengthen this value by helping us reach the more than 4 billion people who have mobile phones, giving them more choice and security when they pay."
"Our customers love the convenience of paying with their mobile numbers - a number they know by heart, and a device that they always have with them," said David Marcus, CEO of Zong. "We look forward to extending our services to PayPal's more than 9 million merchants around the world. And we're committed to working with carriers and merchants to help them drive more sales across devices."
Apparently the Zong system works by entering your mobile number when you want to buy something from a website. You then get a text message, to which you reply and that's that. Its partners include Facebook, Sony Online Entertainment and Zynga.
