Pay-by-phone wins the big prize

By PETER GRIFFIN

An application that effectively turns a cellphone into a virtual wallet has given a New Zealand company victory in the transtasman Frontier mobile application developers' competition.

Frontier attracted 75 submissions this year.

Auckland company MCOM's mPayment application won over much more sophisticated applications designed for 3G networks.

MCOM representatives will now travel to an Ericsson-hosted matchmaking session in Switzerland in December featuring telcos, executives and venture capitalists.

Last year's winner was another Auckland company, IT Link, which is now selling its mobile sales force software worldwide.

MCOM also has an export market in mind and will seek customers among banks and telcos.

Its mTopup service enables Telecom prepaid cellphone users with an ASB Bank account to top up their airtime credit from the account via text-message.

MCOM plans to extend the cellphone service to accounts in other banks and to merchants looking to provide alternative payment methods to cash, Eftpos and credit card.

Shane Williamson, of Australian giant Hutchison 3G, said applications produced by MCOM and the other finalists could be used anywhere in the world.

"MCOM particularly stood out with its sophisticated and mature product that simplifies payments for prepaid mobiles," he said.

The other finalists in the competition were Viva La Mobile, Yambay and Gizmoz from Australia, and TxtCentre and Surelabs from New Zealand.