Bango now provides mobile phone users with the ability to pay for mobile content using their PayPal accounts. Based on a new agreement with PayPal, the company will enable content owners to deliver low cost, direct-to-consumer mobile content, paid for using a PayPal account and one-click purchasing from Bango.
With this agreement, mobile phone users can approve purchases of content such as ringtones, games, wallpapers and videos using pre-approved PayPal payments. Existing PayPal users activate their accounts to pay for mobile content with a one-time visit to the Bango website from a personal computer. They register their phone with Bango and make purchases through Bango, with funds deducted from their PayPal accounts.
Bango has developed and deployed an open infrastructure platform that enables content providers to market, sell and deliver their products and services directly to mobile phone users on all mobile networks using the mobile Internet. This "direct-to-consumer" approach operates alongside the carrier's mobile content portals. Mobile operators such as Cingular, Vodafone, Orange, Telefonica and O2 work with Bango on this direct-to-consumer business.
Content providers who sign up for the Bango Service can market, sell and deliver their products and services directly to users on all mobile networks. Bango enables a fast track to market for content providers, avoiding the need for individual contracts on a carrier-by-carrier basis. In addition, Bango implements and manages content standards and acceptable usage policies from PayPal and the carriers.
"Providing consumers with different billing options will help spur the growth of mobile entertainment services (gaming, ringtones, wallpapers, etc.); especially in regions like North America, where most consumers are on networks that are still closed to off-portal content and billing," said Tuong Nguyen, Research Analyst on Mobile and Wireless at information technology research company Gartner.
