PromptNow project tests mobile payment system

After a pilot project, the service is to be officially launched by the end of the year.
Shimmy Thomas, executive director of PromptNow, said HCE was the future of mobile payments.
The company is cooperating in an HCE pilot project with Siam Commercial Bank for 1,000 users. The system permits payment-card emulation on a device enabled with near-field communication (NFC).
The pilot test will take about six months before the system is officially launched to the market.
“Cloud-based mobile payment allows financial institutions and card [users] to provide a better experience to their growing customer segment of Android users by enabling them to use their devices for proximity payments and other real-world transactions,” Thomas said.
He said that after the official launch in Thailand, the firm planned to provide the mobile payment solution to other markets such as Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam.
Meanwhile PromptNow is negotiating with several banks in Thailand to get them to utilise this new mobile payment system.
Doug Yeager, chief executive of SimplyTapp, said this partnership was his company’s first in Asia. It has already successfully provided the new payment technology in Canada and the United States.
Matsumoto Masahiro, deputy general manager of TIS Inc, said that under this cooperative arrangement, the firm would provide information-technology services and solutions as well as a financial-grade data centre to facilitate the mobile payment system.