By Telecomlead Team: At the Mobile World Congress
2012, Western Union, a global payment service provider, and Millicom, a
mobile operator in 13 markets across Latin America and Africa operating under
the Tigo brand, announced an agreement to introduce cross-border mobile
money transfers in Latin America.
Under this agreement, Millicom will launch money transfer
service in Paraguay under the Giros Tigo brand (Tigo Cash) to offer its
customers in Paraguay the ability to receive money across borders using their
mobile phones.
The service will be expanded to other markets in Latin
America in near future. The agreement will help Western Union deepen its
distribution reach in the markets in which Millicom operates.
We’re uniquely positioned to do this with our network of
more than 450,000 agent locations, long-standing experience in moving money,
and agreements with leading telecommunications groups like Millicom,” said
Diane Scott, chief marketing officer and president, Western Union Ventures
This agreement will allow millions of Tigo customers to
benefit from Western Union’s extensive network of more than 450,000 agent
locations across 200 countries and territories. This service enables Tigo
customers in most of Millicom’s Latin American markets to receive money from
Western Union customers directly into their mobile accounts. They will also be
able to cash out transactions at any Tigo location offering the Giros Tigo
facility.
Millicom has been offering mobile financial services for
over 18 months in Paraguay and in the last quarter of 2011, around 20 percent
of its customers used these facilities.
We continuously strive to offer our customers useful and
affordable services, from communication to entertainment and mobile financial
services. With the addition of cross-border mobile money transfer services
which we will soon provide in conjunction with Western Union, we aim to bring
additional benefits to a growing number of our customers in Latin America,” said Marcelo Cataldo, head of mobile financial services, Millicom Latin
America.
Recently, Ericsson announced it is partnering with
Western Union to support mobile network operators accelerate the launch of
their mobile financial services.
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