MasterCard opens an office in Barcelona attracted by the Mobile World Capital

Barcelona (ACN).- In its commitment to innovate, Master Card has just opened an office in Barcelona in order to take advantage of the synergies in a “pulse for future technological development” according to the president of MasterCard Europe, Javier Perez, as Barcelona was proclaimed World Capital of Mobile Telephony. The company announced the launch into the Spanish market of the ‘PayPas Wallet’, a global technology platform that works as if it were a wallet and unifies payments of online shopping through computers, mobile phones or tablets and physical shopping with the ‘contactless’ system.

MasterCard Europe has only one office per country, so Catalonia will be the first exception: with the opening of the new office in Barcelona, the company has two locations in Spain. According to Javier Perez, this decision reflects the innovation and technology strategy inherent in the company and that “in a revolution in the methods of payment such as that currently being experienced worldwide, MasterCard wants to be a leader in making life easier for consumers and businesses”.

Jesus Perez explained that the location in Barcelona is a strategic investment for the future because the company will “work with leading companies in the mobile telephone world” and will use the city as a “laboratory” and because we want to “be present in the centre of technological innovation” that represents the Mobile World Capital, said the general manager of MasterCard in Spain and Portugal, Pilar Aurrecoechea. In addition, company leaders also stressed the “technology friendly and willing attitude of the Catalan Government and the Barcelona City Council “to do things and help” said Perez, who also stated that “Catalonia will lead the introduction of mobile technology in the new payment systems in Spain”.

Catalonia, leader in Spain of card payment

In this sense, Perez referred to the whole of Catalan consumers and businesses, as leaders in Spain in the use of credit cards. Thus, MasterCard corroborated, with data from a report carried out by Inmark: 45.6% of payments in Catalonia are made by card, while the average in Spain is 38.2%.

MasterCard launches an e-wallet with no card or chip

The opening of the new office in Catalonia coincides with the worldwide launch of ‘Pay Pass Wallet’, a global platform that facilitates online or physical purchases in the stores, and that unifies all current payment systems into one. The new product, which is the result of six years of hard work, is the inclusion of MasterCard in the world of cash cards.

Thus, the ‘Pay Pass Wallet’ is an application that customers can download to their phone, tablet or computer and which will provide with a single ‘click’ three different solutions for retail payments through the ‘contactless’ system that allows all types of purchases with mobile phones with NFC technology. This technology is based on bringing the phone to a payment terminal.

Moreover, the ‘Pay Pass Wallet’ allows the user to easily connect to other payment systems for digital wallets, such as those that have been implemented by financial institutions. The customer will also be able to link all its accounts. All this, without chips or plastic cards because through this application all data will be stored on the Internet.

The new MasterCard application, unveiled last Tuesday worldwide, will be launched first in the Unites States, Canada, the UK and Australia. Then, between the end of this year and early 2013, it will come to Spain and the rest of Europe.