BOKU – The standard in mobile payments

Jun 16, 2009

We’ve been plugging away in stealth mode these last 5 months and I am excited to announce the launch of BOKU. I’ve been working in and studying payments for 20 years. The timing has become optimal for mobile as a payments option, and so I reached out to my co-founders Ron and Erich to put a team together to create what we hope will be the industry standard for mobile payments. We have a lot to announce today including our team, the funding we’ve secured, and the acquisition of the Paymo and Mobillcash businesses.

A GLOBAL STANDARD

Our vision is to create the global standard for mobile payments. To go after this big and challenging opportunity requires some key ingredients.

The first is great people. BOKU has been fortunate to attract team members who have done everything from building the Amazon payment platform, designing fraud engines for PayPal and creating fun (and profitable) web and mobile experiences at places like Apple and Google.

Mobile payments is a global opportunity. To serve merchants and publishers (and their customers) requires broad geographic coverage. To that end, we’re also announcing coverage in over 50 countries; so, whether you’re in Turkey or Malaysia, you can buy virtual goods using BOKU.

Building a big market is hard and building it right, and at scale, is expensive. We are excited to be working with Kevin Harvey (Benchmark), Danny Rimer (Index) and David Weiden (Khosla) who are three of the most forward-thinking, and successful venture capitalists in the world. They and their firms bring decades of deep experience in revolutionary technologies, including eBay, Second Life, Skype, Tellme and Twitter. We appreciate their support and guidance in helping us build a world-class organization.

Pay by Mobile

This is what got me excited about this opportunity.

BOKU is creating the standard for online payments using your mobile phone.

The relationship we all have with our mobile phones has changed in the last 2-3 years and the explosion of virtual goods and online gaming has created a market for this elegant and simple way of making online purchases.

The simpler the value proposition, the more crowded a market can become as companies shift to strike while it’s hot. But, to execute on a standard you need bank-grade payments infrastructure and a skilled operational team. To that end, we’ve acquired the Paymo and Mobillcash businesses, teams and technologies. We’re currently working on integration and extending this platform to become an easy, fast and safe way to pay online using your mobile phone. Stay tuned for more announcements here.

Follow this link for a video that shows a little about the service. I hope you like it.

We appreciate the support of our publishers, consumers and carriers. Please feel free to email me with comments or questions at mark.britto at boku.com.

Mark Britto
CEO and Co-founder