We just received a tip from our reader Ryan who spotted Google’s new Play Store to support buying apps using carrier billing via Telkomsel’s network. Ryan attached a screenshot below showing the payment option to “Set up Telkomsel billing account” which indicates an integration allowing Telkomsel subscriber to start paying for apps on Google Play Store.
This can be a significant partnership to start with, Google’s Android platform has been growing like crazy in the Indonesian mobile market and some even say that it’s currently dominating the smartphone market. The biggest issue was Indonesians cannot pay for apps on the Google Play Store, and now that it supports Telkomsel’s carrier billing means users can start paying for apps. I can only hope that, soon, Indonesian developers can also starts charging for apps for Indonesian users.
Lately, Telkomsel has been paying a lot of attention to the developer community to add more content to its ecosystem, one example is with the partnership with Singapore-based social gaming provider FunSpot. Another telco such as Smartfren and Axis was among one of the first to have jumped into the micropayment-for-app wagon with partnership with payment partners such as Coda Payments and Uangku.
