CAMBRIDGE, England--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Plextek Limited, Europe’s leading independent business, product innovation and design consultancy and RedCloud Technology Limited, a leading investor in mobile financial services in emerging markets, today announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement to acquire the Intellectual Property Rights of Iceni Mobile Ltd including the mobile payments system (the I2S platform) developed by the same team that brought the world’s most successful mobile money service, M-PESA, to market.
The acquisition signifies both Plextek’s and RedCloud’s commitment to the mobile money market. With the founding team, the companies plan to deliver the technology as a platform as a service and create a new way in which mobile money and associated services are taken to market.
“Plextek and RedCloud share a vision for extending the mobile payments value chain to transform the way in which financial services are launched in emerging markets,” said Ian Murphy, Technical Director and Founder of Plextek. “The next generation of mobile payments technology is about leveraging the power of secure cloud computing platforms; it’s about a fundamentally better way to recruit, manage and empower banks to deliver mobile financial services.”
“Our cloud financial services investment strategy is accelerating, and is at the root of the broad-based transformation and innovation we are seeing from customers today,” said Justin Floyd, Founding Partner of RedCloud. “The launch of the Platform as a Service model revolutionizes mobile payments through banks and mobile operators in emerging markets. It’s an important step to making technology available at a lower cost of ownership to those that need it most.”
“We are set to transform the way in which mobile money technology is delivered to financial organizations,” added Warren Carew, one of the founders of Iceni. “Traditional mobile payment software that many financial organizations use today was designed to work in an offline world. Platform as a Service will remove barriers to entry for future providers allowing them to accelerate their entry to market.”
Iceni’s core services provide robust authentication solutions for web access and mobile solutions designed for un-banked populations over multiple service channels. The services include proximity and remote payment services such as in-store or online mobile payment, money transfer, and more. The I2S platform enables banks, payment service providers, and telecom operators to offer accessible and secure financial services to anyone with a phone.
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About Plextek Ltd
At the forefront of business and product innovation, Plextek develops and commercialises diverse technologies across a broad range of market sectors. It is the development partner of choice for 300+ major global organizations, government bodies and ambitious start-up companies.
Established in 1989, Plextek has evolved from a pure ‘design house’ into an international multidisciplinary consultancy capable of transforming businesses and managing customers’ products through the entire product development cycle from concept to supply.
Plextek also has a proven record for transforming entrepreneurial ideas into successful products and businesses, including Blighter (electronic scanning radar), Telensa Ltd (street lighting control infrastructure), PneumaCare Ltd (contact-less lung function measurement) and REDTAIL Telematics Ltd (tracking devices and data warehousing for fleet and insurance applications).
About RedCloud Technology Ltd
RedCloud is an investor in online marketplaces for financial services in developing economies. RedCloud was founded by Martin Frost, formerly CEO of Sagentia plc a leading Cambridge technology company and Justin Floyd, serial Entrepreneur.
RedCloud’s accelerator business model transforms early stage and growth companies throughout the financial services ecosystem, from next generation platforms to a wide range of revolutionary software applications and services. We believe that the next generation of high growth companies in mobile financial services will be driven by Entrepreneurs in the emerging markets.