(23 September 2015 – India) Movida India, a joint venture between Visa and Monitise, has shut down after failing to win over support from mobile network operators, according to reports.
Source said the closure follows the departure of Naushad Contractor, head of the operation. The service was launched in February 2012, in partnership with HDFC Bank.
Although, India’s second largest bank, ICICI Bank joined the scheme, it was reliant on access to the unstructured supplementary service data (USSD) channel operated by the country's wireless networks.
It was envisaged bank customers using the service would be able to pay bills, top up pre-paid airtime and buy tickets from their mobile phones.
“The telecom regulator and the concerned ministries were in favour of letting Visa use the channel of telcos,” one source told media.
“But telcos refused to share their bandwidth and network though they had grudgingly given access to the state-backed National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).”