Orascom Telecom Holding-owned Pakistan’s mobile operator, Mobilink, has launched a mobile banking services in association with Citibank, under an arrangement endorsed by the State Bank of Pakistan.
The new service allows customers to maintain their accounts through their phones and make secure peer to peer money transfers to any Mobilink via SMS. And that’s only a start. In the future, Mobilink hopes to offer users ability to avail and repay loans, purchase goods and services, pay bills, buy airtime and a host of other services.
For the record, earlier this year, Mobilink launched the Mobile Money Order (MMO) service in partnership with Pakistan Post, allowing users in 37 cities (73 outlets) to have access to the benefits of m-commerce.
Commenting on the announcement, Naguib Sawiris, Chairman and CEO of OTH said, “Offering access to financial services via a mobile connection is a project that has been very close to my heart for a long time. The case for mobile financial services is particularly strong in emerging markets where penetration of the financial sector is quite low… Mobilink continues to lead the local telecom industry by exploring new and innovative frontiers.”
[Via: CellularNews]