India Prepaid Market 2011

India Prepaid Market 2011

Third of Mercator's International Series Examines Infrastructure,
Trending, and Market Potential

Boston, MA -- With 1.2 billion residents and the world's ninth largest economy, India is the world's largest underdeveloped payment market. Despite regulatory pressure and progress in the banking industry, the country's infrastructure and banking systems remain inadequate and lacking. While this environment creates room for prepaid development, it also makes sustained industry growth challenging. As a result, closed-loop prepaid dominates the market, and semi-open loop issuers have had to be creative in delivering products work within the current environment before the banking industry catches up.

Mercator's latest research provides a comprehensive overview of the prepaid card market in India. Both open and closed-loop prepaid card markets are discussed, along with an analysis of 11 major prepaid categories. The report also examines major players in the business ecosystem as well as strategic issues such as the regulatory environment and industry trends.

"Within the Indian prepaid market, non-traditional prepaid cards play an important role in serving local consumer need." Terry Xie, director of Mercator Advisory Group's International Advisory Service and principal analyst on the report, commented. "Paper card-based prepaid products became very popular among Indian consumers as they are accepted even at smaller merchants where POS terminals are not installed. For prepaid issuers, developing non-traditional card-acceptance solutions is huge because they allow prepaid cards to be widely adopted without traditional POS infrastructure is not there. And the consumer and merchant base can be migrated towards the more traditional mag-stripe card solution when the industry develops. Today, the prepaid card market in India is booming with the co-existence of both non-traditional and traditional card products."

This report is the third in Mercator's International Prepaid Market series, following China and the U.K.

Highlights of the research findings include:

A review of the players offering competitive prepaid solutions to both organizations and consumers in different market segments.

2010 sales in the India prepaid market, loads across 11 prepaid categories, and the segment accounting for 79.1 percent of the total market.

Dominance and growth outlook for closed and open-loop offerings.

Drawbacks and advantages of India's underdeveloped banking infrastructure.

Shifts prepaid card companies are making to appeal consumers with different needs in this increasingly competitive market.

One of 12 exhibits included in this report:

This report contains 34 pages and 12 exhibits.

Companies mentioned in this report include: Airtel M Commerce Services, Axis Bank, State Bank of India, ICICI Bank, HDFC, MasterCard, Visa, American Express, Paymate, JP Morgan Chase, India Oil, Corp, Pizza Hut, Bharat Petroleum, Future Group, Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd , Pine Labs (Onedesk), Sodexo, Itzcash, and Venture Infotek, among others.

Members of Mercator Advisory Group's International Advisory Service have access to this report as well as the upcoming research for the year ahead, presentations, analyst access and other membership benefits.

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About Mercator Advisory Group
Mercator Advisory Group is the leading, independent research and advisory services firm exclusively focused on the payments and banking industries. We deliver pragmatic and timely research and advice designed to help our clients uncover the most lucrative opportunities to maximize revenue growth and contain costs. Our clients range from the world's largest payment issuers, acquirers, processors, merchants and associations to leading technology providers and investors. Mercator Advisory Group is also the publisher of the online payments and banking news and information portal PaymentsJournal.com.