iPay.lk – A Digital Merchant Platform from Sri Lanka

Abstract

Mobile device ownership has increased across the globe making it the highest adopted platform. With the rapid technology advancements on the smartphones, improvements on the telecommunication networks, falling handset prices and reducing connectivity costs has resulted in mobile devices becoming the primary instrument which our daily lives revolve around transforming how consumers search, evaluate and procure goods or services. Payments are rapidly moving towards mobile while the commerce been transitioning to mobile. The recent developments in information communication technology has played a pivotal role in facilitating the modern digital businesses by reducing time required to perform transactions between buyers and sellers thus creating different customer behaviours. This new digital business paradigm has also resulted in making physical barriers such as distance and time irrelevant. iPay will be able to solve this by performing complex analytics on individuals' payment patterns in order to assist financial institutions calculate a 'credit index'. This availability of credit would greatly assist the rural population in developing cottage industries, which would in-turn provide employment as well as earn foreign exchange.