Fortumo was an Estonian company which developed a platform for digital service providers for user growth and monetization. Fortumo's products allowed digital merchants to acquire new users through telco

bundle Bundle or Bundling may refer to: * Bundling (packaging), the process of using straps to bundle up items Biology * Bundle of His, a collection of heart muscle cells specialized for electrical conduction * Bundle of Kent, an extra conduction pat ...

partnerships and collect payments using carrier billing & mobile wallets. The company connected merchants to a network of more than 300 telcos and digital wallets in Asia, Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa. The company started in 2007 as a spin-off of a mobile service company called Mobi Solutions. In July 2020, the company was acquired by

Boku, Inc. Boku, Inc. is a mobile payments company that allows businesses to collect online payments through both carrier billing and mobile wallets, and is headquartered in San Francisco, California. Boku utilizes mobile network operator (carrier) data t ...

and continued to operate under its existing brand within the group. In February 2022, the company announced consolidating its activities under the

brand.

Products

Fortumo provided digital content merchants with the following products for user growth and monetization: * Payments platform: enabled digital merchants to collect payments from subscribers of over 300 mobile operators and digital wallets. Merchants could choose to either integrate one of the turn-key products provided for this purpose (Web SDK, Unified SDK) or integrate with Fortumo's

API An application programming interface (API) is a way for two or more computer programs to communicate with each other. It is a type of software Interface (computing), interface, offering a service to other pieces of software. A document or standa ...

. * Bundling platform: enabled digital merchants and mobile operators to provision discounted or free digital service access to mobile operator subscribers. Fortumo's platform provided a unified interface for user authentication, service provisioning and configuring any type of bundle offer across dozens of digital service providers and over 280 mobile operators. * Fortumo Insight: provided mobile operators with an overview of their carrier billing performance, including data on account activations, payment behavior, top grossing content by category and payment failure rates. *PayRead platform: enabled digital publishers to collect payments from readers through their mobile operator account and bundle their products with mobile operator plans as well as with other digital service providers.

Customers

Merchants using Fortumo included app stores (

Google Play Google Play, also known as the Google Play Store and formerly the Android Market, is a digital distribution service operated and developed by Google. It serves as the official app store for certified devices running on the Android (operating sys ...

), streaming services (

Amazon Amazon most often refers to: * Amazons, a tribe of female warriors in Greek mythology * Amazon rainforest, a rainforest covering most of the Amazon basin * Amazon River, in South America * Amazon (company), an American multinational technology c ...

Spotify Spotify (; ) is a proprietary Swedish audio streaming and media services provider founded on 23 April 2006 by Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon. It is one of the largest music streaming service providers, with over 456 million monthly active us ...

iflix WeTV iflix, or simply iflix, is a Malaysian free and subscription video on demand (VOD) service focused on emerging markets. Its global headquarters are in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The site serves as a digital hosting and distribution platform fo ...

Sony , commonly stylized as SONY, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. As a major technology company, it operates as one of the world's largest manufacturers of consumer and professional ...

Deezer Deezer is a French online music streaming service. It allows users to listen to music content from record labels, as well as podcasts on various devices online or offline. Created in Paris, Deezer currently has 90 million licensed tracks in i ...

Tidal Tidal is the adjectival form of tide. Tidal may also refer to: * Tidal (album), ''Tidal'' (album), a 1996 album by Fiona Apple * Tidal (king), a king involved in the Battle of the Vale of Siddim * TidalCycles, a live coding environment for music * ...

), social networks (

Facebook Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin M ...

Badoo Badoo is a dating-focused social network founded by Russian entrepreneur Andrey Andreev in 2006. It is headquartered in Limassol, Cyprus and London, United Kingdom,Aftonbladet ''Aftonbladet'' (, lit. "The evening paper") is a Swedish daily newspaper published in Stockholm, Sweden. It is one of the largest daily newspapers in the Nordic countries. History and profile The newspaper was founded by Lars Johan H ...

, Legimi), gaming companies (

Epic Games Epic Games, Inc. is an American video game and software developer and publisher based in Cary, North Carolina. The company was founded by Tim Sweeney as Potomac Computer Systems in 1991, originally located in his parents' house in Potomac, M ...

EA Mobile EA Mobile Inc. is an American video game development studio of the publisher Electronic Arts (EA) for mobile platforms. The studio's primary business is producing games for mobile phones. It has also produced other entertainment-related softwa ...

Kinguin G2 Esports (G2) is a European esports organization headquartered in Berlin, Germany, with players competing in ''League of Legends'', ''Valorant'', '' Counter-Strike: Global Offensive'', '' Hearthstone'', ''Rocket League'', ''Rainbow Six Sieg ...

), transportation service providers (EasyPark,

Mobike Mobike ( zh, s=摩拜单车, p=mó bài dān chē), also known as Meituanbike, founded by Beijing Mobike Technology Co., Ltd. ( zh, s=北京摩拜科技有限公司), is a fully station-less bicycle-sharing system headquartered in Beijing, Chin ...

), classified sites (

OLX OLX Group is a Dutch-domiciled online marketplace headquartered in Amsterdam. The OLX consumer brand originated as OnLine eXchange in 2006. OLX Group is owned by Prosus, the international assets division of Naspers. History OLX brand and Naspe ...

). Fortumo integrated approximately 280 mobile operators into its platform. Fortumo's mobile operator partners included mobile operator groups such as

Telefónica Telefónica, S.A. () is a Spanish multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Madrid, Spain. It is one of the largest telephone operators and mobile network providers in the world. It provides fixed and mobile telephony, broadba ...

Telenor Telenor ASA ( or ) is a Norwegian majority state-owned multinational telecommunications company headquartered at Fornebu in Bærum, close to Oslo. It is one of the world's largest mobile telecommunications companies with operations worldwide, ...

and

Orange Orange most often refers to: *Orange (fruit), the fruit of the tree species '' Citrus'' × ''sinensis'' ** Orange blossom, its fragrant flower *Orange (colour), from the color of an orange, occurs between red and yellow in the visible spectrum * ...

as well as individual mobile operators like

Reliance Communications Reliance Communications Limited (RCOM) was an Indian mobile network provider headquartered in Navi Mumbai that offered voice and 2G and 3G and 4G data services. In February 2019, the company filed for bankruptcy as it was unable to sell asse ...

Turkcell Turkcell İletişim Hizmetleri A.Ş. (''lit. Turkcell Communication Services'') (, ) is the leading mobile phone operator of Turkey, based in Istanbul. The company has 39,3 million subscribers as of September 2021. In 2015, the company's number of ...

and

Globe Telecom Globe Telecom, Inc., commonly shortened as Globe, is a major provider of telecommunications services in the Philippines. The company operates the largest mobile network in the Philippines and one of the largest fixed-line and broadband networks ...

. Fortumo used the mobile operators' technical infrastructure to authenticate users, process payments and enable mobile messaging for its merchants while giving the mobile operators access to real-time data and payments analytics through its Fortumo Insight dashboard.

Venture Capital Investments

In February 2013, Fortumo announced it had completed a growth round of financing with the first external shareholders -

Intel Capital Intel Capital is a division of Intel Corporation, set up to manage corporate venture capital, global investment, mergers and acquisitions. Intel Capital makes equity investments in a range of technology startups and companies offering hardware, so ...

and

Greycroft Partners Greycroft is an American venture capital firm. It manages over $2 billion in capital with investments in companies such as Bird, Bumble, HuffPost, Goop, Scopely, The RealReal, and Venmo. Greycroft was founded in 2006 by Alan Patricof, Dana Set ...

- joining the company. Although financial details about the funding were not disclosed, TechCrunch reported approximately 10 million USD as the size of the deal. Fortumo co-founder Rain Rannu explained the reasons for bringing in investors: "Working with Intel Capital and Greycroft will help us to pursue additional growth opportunities, including strategic partnerships and acquisitions".

Bundling Platform

In February 2017, Fortumo launched a bundling platform for digital content providers and mobile operators. Traditional bundle deals between a digital content provider (such as a VOD company) and a mobile operator require a separate integration between the parties to provision discounted or free digital service access to mobile operator subscribers. With the bundling platform, Fortumo allowed for mobile operators to connect to several digital content providers at once and vice versa, this further provided a unified interface for user authentication, service provisioning and configuring any type of bundle offer. This made the launch of bundle partnerships quicker and easier for both parties involved. In March 2019, Fortumo deployed its Trident Bundling Platform to connect Amazon with the Indian telco BSNL. Later in the year, the company announced additional Amazon launches with

Tata Sky Tata Play (stylised as TΛTΛ PLΛY, formerly TΛTΛ , sky) is an Indian direct broadcast satellite (DTH) service provider using MPEG-4 digital compression technology, transmitting using INSAT-4A and GSAT-10 satellite. Incorporated in 2005; it ...

and

Orange Spain Orange most often refers to: *Orange (fruit), the fruit of the tree species '' Citrus'' × ''sinensis'' ** Orange blossom, its fragrant flower *Orange (colour), from the color of an orange, occurs between red and yellow in the visible spectrum * ...

. In September 2020, the company announced the launch of Amazon for

Jio Reliance Jio Infocomm Limited, doing business as Jio, is an Indian telecommunications company and a subsidiary of Jio Platforms, headquartered in Navi Mumbai, Maharashtra, India. It operates a national LTE network with coverage across all 2 ...

PayRead platform

In January 2019, Fortumo launched PayRead platform that enabled digital publishers (like international media group

Schibsted Schibsted Media Group is an international media group. The company has its headquarters in Oslo, Norway, and is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange. The CEO is Kristin Skogen Lund. In 2019, Schibsted spun off the majority of their online marketplac ...

) to identify and charge consumers through their SIM card. In March 2019, PayRead was also connected to the bundling platform. That enabled publishers to bundle their products with mobile operator plans, as well as with other digital service providers.

Acquisition by Boku

In June 2020,

() announced that it intended to acquire Fortumo for $45 million. The acquisition was completed on July 1st, 2020. Jon Prideaux, CEO of Boku explained the acquisition: "Boku has always grown by a mixture of organic growth and selective acquisition. This deal, which will be our sixth, cements our position as the scale player in Direct Carrier Billing. It brings together the two most profitable players in the industry, with compatible technology, complementary customers and with a great cultural fit." After the acquisition, Fortumo continued to operate under its existing brand as a separate organization within the Boku group of companies until February 2022.

References

{{Mobile payments Mobile payments Mobile telecommunications Mobile technology companies Information technology companies of Estonia Online payments Estonian companies established in 2007 Estonian brands Tartu