Google launched its mobile payment platform ‘In-App Billing’ last month. This attractive platform will support a lot of applications within the Android market. This means Google has expanded its capability to the mobile area. Because there are powerful players such as PayPal in the online payment industry, it’s not easy for Google to increase its market share in that area with only Google Checkout. But for now, Google has a chance to leverage its mobile ecosystem for changing the paradigm of the payment platform industry.
[ Feature of In-App Billing ]
Start the Mobile Payment
Experts say the next battlefield of the payment platform is the mobile market. As many of you already have seen the financial results of several online companies such as game and music, digital contents are the attractive sources of the next revenue. By now, this market is driven by several mega players such as Amazon, Apple and AOL. Because they’ve secured contracts with big contents providers, they can provide digital contents very easily.
But recently the number of contents providers has increased and this trend will be maintained. Previously, although many players wanted to distribute their digital contents after the Web2.0, it was not easy for long tail players to take control to sell their business products. But in the mobile world, it is easier and simpler for these players to access to customers and users directly via mobile applications. And Google has provided the function of mobile payment just in time.
Get Real Products
Under the influence of social shopping which are driven by Groupon, many people are buying real products or services through online channels. Though it’s not common to provide this social coupon via a mobile application, there is an increasing number of companies and local proprietors which want to deliver their services and items through the mobile channel. To grab this demand of non-digital items, many players are considering NFC platform as a main option. If a user pays for the bill offline via the mobile payment, it means Google has a chance to arbitrate the commerce process by using In-App Billing tightly interconnected to the offline shop application. Though this opportunity of the referral business is not expected to be real in the near future, It will place Google to the important position in the shopping value chain.
Know Consumer’s Preference
There are two camps in the mobile ecosystem, iTunes(including AppStore) and Android market. If the trend adopts Google Android as the main OS, the power of Android Market will get bigger. But it is necessary to know a user’s preference and to provide an optimized service interface for winning in this battlefield. Apple comparatively has a tidy service channel. But because the company has run its channel in a closed form, Google rather seams to have more flexibility to expand Android Market. And it is possible to know a detailed preference based on billing information.
We don’t know how Google’s trial will be ended. There are several variable factors in the payment industry. So many players are trying out various types of testbeds including PayPal and credit card companies. Nonetheless, Google has a good start.