mFoundry, a provider of mobile financial services, announced today that its ground-breaking work for Starbucks was recognized best in category for Best Virtual Prepaid Card in the Fourth Annual Paybefore Awards.
"The concept of mobilizing gift cards has been much discussed in recent years and might appear to be an easy task. However, doing so in a simple and elegant fashion while allowing the consumer to adopt a completely new interaction with their stored value cards is an art — one that mFoundry prides itself on delivering," said Jon Squire, senior vice president of Wallet & Payments for mFoundry.
Paybefore Awards are recognitions of excellence in the worldwide prepaid and stored-value-card industry. The awards are presented annually by Prepaid Media, whose Paybefore publications are the leading source of industry information for the global prepaid community.
"With the Starbucks Mobile pilot, mFoundry is pushing delivery of prepaid services to a new place—using a mobile device to make it easier and more convenient for cardholders to conduct a multitude of tasks related to their Starbucks cards," said Marilyn Bochicchio, Paybefore CEO and chair of the judging panel. "This solution for iPhone users is forward thinking and a significant prototype for integrating the prepaid and mobile worlds."
Developed by mFoundry and launched on Sept.22, 2009, the Starbucks Card Mobile application was the first national mobile gift card deployment in the United States. The solution is available on the iPhone/iPod Touch and offers customers mobile access to an unprecedented range of features including the ability to consolidate all current gift cards onto a personal mobile device, check card balances in real time, reload & auto-reload balances remotely and locate stores that can accept payment. Additionally, the product introduction includes an added feature in select stores that also have the ability to accept payments directly from a customer's mobile device.
"In mobile payments there rarely is such a perfect nexus of customer purchasing behavior and early adopters of technology; the combination of loyal Starbucks coffee drinkers and savvy iPhone customers is a dream come true for mobile commerce," Squire said. "We were honored to be recognized by Paybefore and even more excited to win in our category."
mFoundry's retail solution mobilizes gift card and loyalty programs offering retailers a proven solution that is secure, scalable and flexible. Using this platform, retailers can empower customers at the point-of-purchase and use this solution for queue management.
