Over the past ten years, the mobile phone has become as indispensable for many as the wallet - one simply doesn't leave home without it. At the same time, the phone has absorbed the functionality of a number of accessories and gadgets, from the old-fashioned (address book, wristwatch) to the modern (digital camera, music player). In the coming years, the mobile handset will likely resemble a mobile version of the computer: a fully customizable super-gadget with thousands of software-based applications.
The wallet, however, is one real-world accessory that has proven harder to transfer onto the handset.
Over the next few weeks we will cover Mobile Top-up and M-Payment Adoption in China. This series will take a closer look at mobile top-up, a service which allows users to pay their phone bills through the phone itself. We will identify the factors currently hindering m-payment growth in China and show how top-up may just be the "killer-app" that introduces m-payment to China's 500 million mobile users and breaks open the door for all m-payment companies.
