The basic idea is simple: when at a local coffee bar, why should you wait in queue twice, once for paying the bill and once for taking the coffee? Just pay with your mobile app while in line. When at desk, show your digital receipt – that is, something on the screen of your smartphone – and take the coffe. Quick. But, indeed, GoPago is much more than this.
Founded a couple of years ago by Leo Rocco, entrepreneur with a background in engineering, and Vincenzo Di Nicola, co-founder and CTO, GoPago aims to “Re-imagine the way consumers and brick and mortar businesses use smartphones for mobile commerce” – they say on their website, and to “Enable consumers to easily browse, order and pay for everything from food and drinks to haircuts and dry cleaning, while giving merchants a one-stop mobile storefront that lets them run their business and build customer loyalty”. And their potential is now assured by the investment they recently received from JPMorgan, as reported yesterday by Reuters.
The sum is undisclosed, but I met Vincenzo some time ago and I have learned that it is an important move for all the Mobile Payments and the mCommerce sector.
The arena is vast: enabling local businesses to accept mobile payments can increase sales from usual customers or new ones, thanks also to geo-localization and eventual social features. And this allows a number of new players to enter a game, that, until recently, has been locked in the cashier machine by few payment operators – typically, credit cards. Finding the key to open this market could be a significant opportunity.
Of course, these solutions need the trust of the shopkeeper, and that is where the competition actually is, while different new approaches struggle to find the best market fit. Think, example giving, to Jack Dorsey’s Square (backed by Visa) or the rumored new solution for offline payments coming from PayPal. JPMorgan Chase itself, as said in the above-mentioned note, is experimenting, and “Plans to start testing a mobile payments service in April using an application from GoPago Inc.”
What remains is that Mobile Commerce seems on the verge of taking off. Will it? Have your say.
