Mobile Commerce
Mobile Commerce is the ability to conduct commerce, using a mobile device e.g. a mobile phone, a PDA, a smartphone while on the move.
Mobile commerce is currently mainly used for the sale of mobile phone ring-tones and games, although as 3G/UMTS services roll out it is increasingly used to enable payment for location-based services such as maps, as well as video and audio content, including full length music tracks. Other services include the sending of information such as football scores via SMS.
Currently the main payment methods used to enable mobile commerce are:
- premium-rate calling numbers,
- charging to the mobile telephone user's bill or
- deducting from their calling credit, either directly or via reverse-charged SMS.
Mobile commerce was coined in the late 1990s during the dot-com boom. The idea that highly profitable mobile commerce applications would be possible though the broadband mobile telephony provided by 2.5G and 3G cellphone services was one of the main reasons for hundreds of billions of dollars in licensing fees paid by European telecommunications companies for UMTS and other 3G licenses in 2000 and 2001.
Other examples of mobile commerce applications are information-on-demand systems like news services or stock tickers, banking and stock brokerage applications by SMS, WAP or iMode.