Deutsche Bank 24 is to take a minority stake in Internet payments company eCash Technologies and expand its use of the product. The direct banking arm of Deutsche Bank currently provides eCash payment services to its German customer base.
New features planned for next year include mobile access through cell phones and PDAs, payments at physical retail locations, new user interfaces and enhanced merchant administration and settlement. The new raft of services will be unveiled for the first time at the Cebit 2001 technology fair.
The bank will also be adding many new merchant venues for Internet shoppers in Germany over the next few months. Aral, Data Becker, Vobis Microcomputers and Spinnrad are among the most recent recruits to the service. The bank has plans for over 300 additional merchants to come online by the end of this year.
Deutsche Bank 24 began offering eCash payments to customers in February in combination with the co-branded Yahoo MasterCard credit card, after a multi-year pilot programme with eCash Technologies.
Strong user acceptance of the product, a versatile payment engine which supports a variety of electronic payment methods, has convinced the bank to take a mintority stake in eCash Technologies and to apply its brand and strategic relationships to promote its wider uptake.