Flint Mobile, a provider of integrated marketing tools for mobile businesses, has received $6 million in Series B funding from Digicel and SVG Ventures. The financial support will help accelerate growth for the company, as well as provide capital towards new goods and services for the mobile payments market, according to a company press release.
Specifically the newly acquired funding will help Flint improve its iPhone and Android apps, which are designed to allow small businesses to scan credit card numbers for purchases via their mobile device’s built-in camera.
“Our new funding partners position Flint well to drive the next wave of solutions designed to meet the needs of millions of service-centric, mobile small businesses,” said Greg Goldfarb, Co-founder and CEO of Flint. “While many others in the industry are replacing retail point of sale (POS) systems and cash registers with tablet apps, we’re focused on empowering the ‘non-countertop’ businesses that operate outside of a store and have different requirements. As a result of strong demand for our unique approach, we’ve seen transaction volume grow by more than 10 times in under a year.”
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Flint is responding to the growing need for updated and innovative mobile offerings. In a Q4 2012 survey conducted by Sybase 365 and the Mobile Marketing Association (MMA), 28% of respondents said they would like an enhanced POS experience related to mobile payments.
“Consumers are ready and willing to use mobile devices not only to search brands but purchase as well,” said Michael Becker, Managing Director of MMA North America, in a statement regarding the survey. “It is up to the industry to advance the mobile commerce experience and take advantage of this opportunity to engage more meaningfully with consumers. After all, nothing gets marketers closer to consumers than mobile.”
Retailers often do not have the resources to invest in a full-scale POS system, according to Dan Dufault, Executive Vice President of Marketing & Solution Innovation for Merchant Warehouse. But mobile payment technology presents a major growth opportunity for the entire payments industry, offering smaller businesses the ability to accept a new form of payment.
