UK headquartered mobile banking firm Monitise
has reported a net loss of over GBP16 million (USD25 million) for
the 12 months to end June, despite a 136% increase in revenue.
Monetise net loss increased by 12.4%
year-on-year, marking the 6th year of losses, despite
revenues more than doubling in each of the past three years,
reaching GBP36.1 million in 2012.
Mobile payment consultant Georg Fasching told
Electronic Payments International that the losses are due
to the recent acquisition of US competitor Clairmail. The
deal was valued at GBP108 million.
Fasching said the acquisition will boost
Monetise’s operations in the US.
“Monetise had a bit of work in the US, but not
nearly as many customers as Clairmail. They are now working to
integrate their business into Monetise’s structure,” he said.
Monetise is also targeting Asia for expansion.
On 4 September 2012, Monitise Asia Pacific- the joint venture
Monitise formed with the mobile technology unit of the Asian fund
First Eastern Investment Group in 2010 – struck a deal with the
Hong Kong subsidiary of Bank of China (BOCHK) to develop its mobile
money services.
Monitise chief commercial officer Lee
Cameron said: “Hong Kong has one of the highest levels
of smartphone penetration in the world and a long
heritage of payments innovation. We are delighted to be working
together with BOCHK in Hong Kong.”
Earlier this year, Monitise also entered into
partnerships with one of the subsidiaries of PT Bank Permata,
Indonesia’s largest bank by assets, and HDFC Bank, India’s third
largest bank by assets.
Monitise Group chief executive Alastair Lukies
said: “As a company of unprecedented scale in this space and with
the ongoing support of our strategic partners, we are executing on
our strategy to capitalise on the global mobile money
business opportunity.”
“We are focused on delivering profitability
earlier than anticipated,” he added.
Visa Europe became Monitise largest
shareholder in August 2012, when it almost doubled its stake in the
company (now 10.2%), by buying 45.3 million Monitise shares.
Monitise share price has fallen by almost 7%
in the last 12 months.
