Three operators ushered in the dawn to obtain a third party to pay the license

The three biggest operators, who have been depressed for a long time, have finally been released by the central bank, with their coveted third party payment licences.

Recently, in the third batch of the central bank issued a total of 61 non-financial Payment business License list, Zhongtian Wing e-Commerce Co., Ltd., unicom wo Yi Network Technology Co., Ltd. and the Sino-Migration E-commerce Co., Ltd. impressively in the list. They are Chinese telecom, China Unicom (600050, the shares) and China Mobile's exclusive subsidiary responsible for payment operations.

It is reported that, with the approval of the central bank license, three operators will be able to carry out mobile phone payments, bank card receipts and other services. Among them, telecom and Unicom can also carry out fixed-line payment business. Previously, the central bank in May 26 and August 31 last year two to pay the third party enterprises to issue licences, the number of issuance is 27 and 13 respectively.

In fact, the three operators have long been eager to pay for the mobile payment, ready early. It is reported that in the first two batches of Third-party payment licence applications, the three major telecom operators are involved, but because operators are considered in a number of niche areas with congenital advantages, has not been released. After getting a licence, it means that the three operators can finally make a big splash.

However, although the mobile payment market has great potential, there are also bottlenecks. In the case of near-field payment NFC (Near field communication abbreviation, short-range wireless communication technology), it is the largest application area of mobile payment, although the technology is mature, but lacks the necessary infrastructure. Operators want to create a mobile payment of the flourishing era still to wait.

Licensed

The big three carriers are not denying the desire for mobile payments. Moreover, in the exploration of mobile payment, the operator's pace is also much earlier than the UnionPay system.

As early as 2001, China Mobile launched the "mobile phone short Message Bank" business, in 2002, the Chinese mobile in Chongqing, the first commercial domestic mobile E-commerce platform and the first mobile phone vending system. Since then, China Mobile in Hunan set up a mobile E-commerce pilot base, and the following year will be the pilot expansion to Chongqing and Guangzhou.

2009, China Mobile to speed up the layout of mobile payments, but also with the Pudong Bank (600000, shares bar) to launch WAP mobile phone bank, and in 2010 investment in Pudong Bank 40 billion yuan, holding 20%.

Compared to China Mobile, the Chinese telecom started relatively late, but the strength should not be underestimated. 2010, China Telecom joined hands to launch "wing Payment", which supports various types of mobile phone industry cards, bus cards, school and enterprise internal card accounts, bank cards and other payment methods.

China Unicom also has a strong interest in mobile payments, began in 2007 with UnionPay, in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, Chongqing and other cities to carry out mobile payment experiments and the launch of mobile wallet business. 2010, Unicom and Bank of China (601988, shares bar) to establish a strategic partnership. Then with China Ping ' an (601318, shares bar), Alipay, Shanghai Bank to achieve cooperation and common development of mobile payment business.

Although the three major operators do not conceal their own mobile payments in the field of coveted, but suffer from the hands of unlicensed, can only be free in the payment industry door, and can not show their fists. The three operators have repeatedly applied for the payment of licences, but the embarrassment of the 3 giants is that every time they apply, they end up being called back by the central bank. Outsiders believe that the three operators have a natural monopoly advantage, easy to pay, easily formed a monopoly on the financial system also has a lot of impact, to the operator licensing is to raise tiger infestation.

It is understood that on May 26 last year, the central bank issued the first batch of 27 non-financial payment business license, last August 31, issued a 2nd batch of 13 licences. These 40 lucky families can be engaged in internet payment, mobile phone payment, prepaid card issue and reception, POS receipts, currency exchange, fixed telephone payment and other 7 major types of business. However, the three major operators are not.

The wishes of the three operators were finally realized in the last day of 2011. On the same day, the central bank issued a third batch of a total of 61 non-financial payment business license, Mobile, Telecom, unicom three operators finally got the coveted electronic payment license.

The industry believes that the three major operators officially enter the third party payment market, the development of the industry has an important significance, is conducive to the promotion of the entire mobile payment industry chain to improve the development of related chip research, POS machine production.

Ice breaking

Carrier access to electronic payment licences may mean that mobile payments, especially NFC (near-distance communication technology) payments will usher in an ice-breaking moment.

Although repeatedly frustrated, but why do the three operators have a special interest in mobile payment? The reason is that the market for mobile payments is growing fast. According to the "Domestic mobile payment Market annual comprehensive report 2011", 2011 Mobile payment users will reach 220 million households, the market revenue will reach 5.24 billion yuan. And 2013 is expected to break through 20 billion yuan, to reach 23.51 billion yuan.

For operators, there is another surprise for the payment of licences now. With NFC spreading to more devices, the global NFC-enabled handset shipments will reach 80 million by the end of 2012, according to IMS Research, a UK study firm.

"Over the past 12 months, most of the leading handset makers have launched NFC handsets, such as Samsung, RIM, Nokia and HTC," said Don Tait, senior analyst at IMS Tang Tet. "According to his introduction, in the past year, the global NFC machine shipments of 35 million, in the top-ranked brand handset manufacturers, currently only Apple has not entered the market."

In fact, NFC payments are not the only ones that are now available, first in 2004 years. At that time, Philips, Sony, Nokia co-sponsored the NFC Forum, began to promote the market NFC business applications. 2006, Philips Semiconductor division from the company Independent, become today's RFID/NFC Semiconductor, is currently the first major supplier of chip.

Nokia, one of the three companies that launched the NFC Forum, had a chance to make NFC handsets shine. It launched the NFC phone in 2007 CES, at that time on the mobile phone demo application, even if put in today is not outdated: as long as the mobile phone to touch the street Publicity window, you can automatically get business phone number and a key dial out; get the message. One key to save as a contact Touch the printer can automatically upload a photo of Bluetooth printing; touch the electronic photo frame to automatically upload photos of your phone.

But it is disappointing that Nokia has not grasped this opportunity and launched more high-end smartphones. Moreover, its advocates for NFC forums are limited in support of developers, with thresholds high enough to scare developers who are interested in this field. It is reported that the Nokia NFC SDK to obtain a license of 800 euros, the rental of Nokia local interactive server for at least 400 euros.

Nokia, coupled with a lack of operator support, has caused the current market to develop slowly. But with the increase in the number of mobile phone manufacturers, as well as the three major domestic operators get permission, NFC payment will usher in the outbreak, has become the industry consensus. At present, UK Orange UK and Barclaycard have launched a "Quick Tap" contactless payment solution.

Google is in advance of NFC layout, as early as 2010, its release of the Android 2.3 operating system began to support the NFC feature. And last February, it pre-installed the feature on its two-Nexus One and Nexus S,--NFC is the selling point of the two handsets.

Last October, Google made persistent efforts, its Android 4.0 version of NFC based application--android beam became the biggest bright spot, the function emphasizes the machine to the data exchange function, two mobile phone touch can exchange photos, business cards, etc., more convenient than Bluetooth.

In China, operators with mobile terminals are also beginning to lay their own. Prior to that, China Mobile Shanghai company launched the RFID Non-contact mobile payment services, Unicom and the Chinese telecom also launched the relevant mobile payment platform.

Still need to cultivate

The industry believes that the move may lead to a "blowout" in China's mobile payments industry, after operators receive electronic payment licences.

Chen Jiachun, deputy director of the Ministry of Communications Development, said in an interview that the current mobile payment in the field of standards are not unified, will directly affect the development and growth of mobile payment industry chain. According to his introduction, although nearly two years through continuous exploration and layout, mobile payment industry has begun to take shape, but mobile payment is a new business, has not yet formed a unified standard, which is divided into near-field payment and remote payment two ways. NFC payments are a technology that operators and mobile phone companies are keen on.

In his opinion, because the standard is not unified, chip, card, handset terminal supplier is relatively few, such POS machine, card and handset terminal's cost is also relatively high, to the business cost caused a certain obstacle. Even in the best developed Japanese market, NFC is limited to payment-related services such as bus cards, small payments and so on, far from playing the full potential of NFC.

Moreover, NFC payments involve a long industrial chain, from operating system to hardware to operators and businesses, each of which affects the NFC process. At present, the operating system and hardware level has been basically mature, but not mature operators and merchants. Without enough NFC phone users, it will be difficult to attract the active participation of businesses. And operators also need to be in the billing, partitioning and other business aspects of the use of NFC features to plan the deployment.

In fact, there is so much resistance to domestic phone payments because there are too many standards in the industry. Lack of standards, not only to mainstream consumption can not be formed, but also to the upstream manufacturers can not chip production. It is reported that the current mainstream technical standards have 13.56Mhz and 2.4G, the former application of China Unicom, Chinese Telecom, UnionPay, and China Mobile chose the latter.

The outbreak of China Mobile payment industry also has to undergo a period of market cultivation. Consulting company analyst Meng that, the NFC payment receives the low user acceptance degree, the market demand waits for the development, accepts the environment to be improved, the industry chain participant's cooperation waits for the enhancement and so on many problems, the large-scale eruption to need at least two or three years time.