Unicom Payment Ltd. expects its strategy to move into mobile payments in China to benefit significantly from an agreement it signed recently with MasterCard Worldwide.
The two companies signed a memorandum of understanding for potential cooperation in emerging mobile payments, including through a Virtual Card Network, MasterCard inControl, MasterCard PayPass and the development of mobile wallets.
Through the agreement, MasterCard would launch mobile-payment services using the distribution channels of Unicom, which would benefit from the card brand’s business experience, a Unicom spokesperson tells PaymentsSource.
Unicom Payment is a wholly owned subsidiary of China Unicom, China’s second largest mobile operator. The company provides long-distance and NFC payment services to individual customers and payment products and services for corporate customers.
“This is a good start as far as collaboration between Western and Chinese companies go, and we will see further such collaborations between banks, card associations, third-party providers and operators from across the borders,” Weidong Wang, an analyst with Beijing-based iResearch, tells PaymentsSource.
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