Far EasTone unveils mobile commerce platform

Far Eas­T­one Telecom­mu­ni­ca­tions, Taiwan’s third-largest mobile provider, unveiled Wednes­day a mobile com­merce plat­form pow­ered by tech­nol­o­gy from Seat­tle-based Sirqul.

Called FET SoLo­Mo, the plat­form will enable devel­op­ers, mer­chants, brands and retail­ers to offer cus­tomers mobile ads and dig­i­tal coupons inte­grat­ed into mobile apps and tai­lored to users’ real-life habits, includ­ing their cur­rent phys­i­cal loca­tion.

Far Eas­T­one is the first Asian tele­com to launch the all-inclu­sive mobile com­merce plat­form, which is expect­ed to increase mon­e­ti­za­tion for devel­op­ers and direct­ly increase rev­enue for mer­chants and brands, accord­ing to the com­pa­ny.

Far Eas­T­one said it is invit­ing local devel­op­ers, retail­ers and brands to join the plat­form, which is sched­uled to hit the mar­ket in the first quar­ter of 2014 with an expect­ed 1,200 retail part­ners, 3,000 mobile apps and 5,000 dig­i­tal coupons.

“We are thrilled to be the first mobile oper­a­tor in Tai­wan to offer an inte­grat­ed social, local and mobile com­merce plat­form,” said Charlene Hung, exec­u­tive vice pres­i­dent of inter­net and com­merce at Far Eas­T­one.

“Sirqul’s his­to­ry of mobile and tech­ni­cal com­merce exper­tise has brought to life our vision of inter­con­nect­ed­ness and we stand impressed by their abil­i­ty to seam­less­ly inte­grate with our mobile infra­struc­ture,” she said in a press release.

David Liu, Sirqul’s COO, said that Tai­wan is a key mar­ket as the com­pa­ny expands over­seas into the Asia-Paci­fic region.

“We val­ue this part­ner­ship to pow­er one of the largest, most for­ward-think­ing mobile oper­a­tors in Tai­wan and look ahead to future expan­sion oppor­tu­ni­ties into sur­round­ing Asian mar­kets,” Liu said.

Robert Fred­er­ick, Sirqul’s founder and chief tech­nol­o­gy offi­cer, told a media brief­ing in Taipei that Tai­wan is one of the top mar­kets for both mobile apps and peo­ple who are inter­est­ed in using those apps for enter­tain­ment or con­sump­tion.

Sirqul will con­tin­ue to seek oth­er Asian part­ners that will share the same vision as the com­pa­ny to build a mobile com­merce ecosys­tem with devel­op­ers, retail­ers and con­sumers, Fred­er­ick said.