The Cimbal

Cimbal, Inc. has been selected as a Finalist for Red Herring’s Global 100 award, a prestigious list honoring the year’s most promising private technology ventures throughout the world.

The Red Herring editorial team selected the most innovative companies from a pool of 1,200 companies from across the world – the Finalists from its Red Herring Asia, Europe and North America Awards. The nominees are evaluated on both quantitative and qualitative criteria, such as financial performance, technology innovation, quality of management, execution of strategy, and integration into their respective industries.

This unique assessment of potential is complemented by a review of the actual track record and standing of a company, which allows Red Herring to see past the “buzz” and make the list an important instrument for discovering and advocating the greatest business opportunities in the industry.

“2010 was very difficult but extremely rewarding,” said Alex Vieux, publisher and CEO of Red Herring. “Despite lingering effects of the global economic situation, there are many great companies producing truly innovative and amazing technologies, to the extent that we had a hard time narrowing the pool and selecting the finalists. Cimbal shows great promise and therefore deserves to be among the Finalists. Now we’re faced with the difficult task of selecting the Winners of the Top 100 Global Award.”

Finalists for the award are selected based upon their technological innovation, management strength, market size, investor record, customer acquisition, and financial health. During the several months leading up to the announcement, hundreds of companies in spaces such as mobile, security, Web 2.0, software, hardware, biotech, and clean tech sent in their submissions to qualify for the award.

The Finalists are invited to present their winning strategies at the Red Herring Global forum in Los Angeles, January 24-26, 2011. The Top 100 winners will be announced at a special awards ceremony on January 26 at the event.

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Gridley & Company LLC, investment bankers to the information services industry, will be hosting is 10th annual conference in New York City on January 11, 2011.  This year’s theme, “IDEA,” stands for Innovation, Disruption, Engagement and Action, all vital elements to Cimbal’s mobile transaction system. Cimbal’s President & CEO Chris Boone has been invited to present Cimbal and speak about its mobile payment solution. The conference will serve as a forum for participants to network and discuss how the internet, social media, cloud computing, and globalization markets are rapidly changing the competitive dynamics across all our industry sectors.

Participating in the annual conference are over 450 industry leaders, emerging growth companies and financial investors across the information services industry.

The “Mobile commerce” category has historically lumped together disparate services, from mobile banking apps to remittances to NFC. While all of these are interesting, they are mostly services that have been ported to phones. Even NFC solutions that are embedded or stuck onto a phone are hardly differentiated from a classic credit card. What really makes a mobile commerce solution interesting is the use of an available network and a cloud based platform to add value to the transaction – targeted promotions, real time offers, integrated loyalty and reward programs and of course secure payment – all in a user-friendly experience with a mobile device. With this IDEA theme, we’ll talk about mobile commerce as it relates to connected transaction solutions – those that leverage the lifestyle device of choice – a mobile device – a network, and how Cimbal combines economic incentive, convenience and secure processing to add value to each of the three constituents in a transaction:  the Consumer, the Merchant and the Bank.  Cimbal, the smart way to pay.®

The event is by invitation only and limited to senior executives and investors.  Make sure you secure your spot to hear Chris present Cimbal at 11:25am ET at The Essex House on Central Park South.

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Cimbal was included in a January 7, 2011 Chicago Tribune article, “Make Way for a Cashless Lifestyle,” discussing the latest in cashless lifestyle trends.  “Smart phones will make use of bar codes, speeding the move away from cash. The minimal investment required means some retailers are adopting programs…that lets shoppers scan products as they pick them up, then complete the purchase with account information stored on their phones. Terminals with the Cimbal system produce a bar code that triggers a payment when scanned into a smart phone.”

Analysts from various industry categories – investment banking, payment research firms, management consultants and beyond – are all forecasting 2011 as the Year for Mobile Payments.  Cimbal looks aims to take a leading role in this social, global phenomenon that is mobile payments.  You can download the free Cimbal application from the iPhone and Android appstores or from our website – get it today!

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AITE Group published a new report on the state of mobile payments in the U.S.: U.S. Mobile Payments: The Time Has Come.

AITE finds that the U.S. market is further ahead of the curve than generally perceived with mobile payments forecast to reaching US$214 bn (gross) in 2015, up from $16bn in 2010 – a 68% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) between 2010 and 2015.

U.S. Mobile Payments Gross Dollar Volume (GDV) (Source: Aite Group)

AITE conducted an in-depth conversation with Cimbal to understand Cimbal’s approach to a unified user experience for payments in-store, online and person-to-person. An important point in the conversation was how Cimbal provides the convenience of NFC with identical or higher security but without the cost of dedicated hardware for the merchant and the consumer.

The 65-page Impact Report contains 27 figures and 11 tables. Clients of Aite Group’s Retail Banking service can download the report, otherwise it is available at AITE for $4,000.

Aite Group is an independent research and advisory firm focused on business, technology, and regulatory issues and their impact on the financial services industry.

Contact Cimbal for additional information on the technology and the financial network.

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Cimbal got great coverage on Mashable: New Startup Seeks to Turn Your Mobile Phone into a Wallet Replacement. The article covers the wide range of mobile payment solutions trying to gain market share – each in a different segment and with a different twist and Jenn Van Grove on Mashable concludes:

“Newly launched startup Cimbal seeks to be the best of a bunch by satisfying all the aforementioned purposes with a consumer- and merchant-friendly software-only approach to mobile payments.”

Looking at the almost 1300 tweets and the many comments and  the fast growing registration numbers of people downloading Cimbal onto their iPhone or Android phone – people agree.

One way Cimbal stands out is in its ability to speedily authorize payments and settle transactions in real time. What this means is that merchants or consumers who accept a mobile payment via Cimbal will find those funds deposited into their accounts instantly.

Experience Cimbal and get the Cimbal app on your iPhone or Android Phone today.

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I just learned from our engineering team that Cimbal – the mobile payment network that allows you to pay with your phone is available on Android. It’s not even announced yet but I want to share the news with you right away. As Cimbal blog readers you are the first to get access and try Cimbal on your Android phone.

This is very exciting news for everyone involved in advanced payment solutions and especially for all Android user. Now the majority of smart phone users can pay with Cimbal – the smart way to pay.

We tested the Cimbal app on a wide range of phones  and welcome your feedback as you install Cimbal on your device.

Here are some  locations to get the app:

• androidzoom
• appbrain
• androlib
• androidpit

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As the world of electronic payments seeks innovative solutions in payment processing, security and mobile integration, technologies like NFC (near field communication) chips and RFID (radio frequency identification) tags seems to be top of mind. These technologies are neither new nor particularly innovative. The unfortunate trend in the payment industry is that payment innovation lags technology innovation by (typically) 10 years. In today’s Bank Info Security article, “The Future of Mobile Payments,” mobile security expert Jason Rouse says NFC communications are less secure than traditional payments. That does not mean, he says, that banks and credit unions should shy away from offering mobile payments. It just means institutions need to be aware of the risks and adequately prepare for potential security gaps and vulnerabilities to transaction interception. Are you kidding? Deploying NFC is akin to trying to sell a faster fax machine – better technology and solutions are available at a fraction of the cost with a greater gain in security, consumer convenience and future flexibility. In my mind, NFC is DOA. Don’t believe the hype. [Read more →]

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The cost of debit-card transactions without PIN by merchants is driven by swipe fees and merchants “share” these fees with customers ultimately via product and service cost. New York Post in an article on the battle between Visa and First Data on swipe fees covers the efforts by the “Durbin Bill” to lower fees. While Visa has a vested interest in keeping swipe fees high, the revenue of First Data is directly connected to lower fee structures and PIN-based transactions.

Cimbal’s software-only solution is best placed to bypass the whole issue and offer a new tender type that not only requires no swipe or other payment terminals but also offers a new transaction fee model that benefits merchants and consumers alike.

Rather than moving to PIN-enabled card transactions, merchants are looking for a solution that reduces cost and risk at the same time: Frank Hayes at StorefrontBacktalk writes “Cimbal flips the process” of payment resulting in higher security, lower fees and shorter transaction times.

There are clear benefits in using a 2-D barcode as no additional hardware is required, the code can be displayed on any monitor, even printed on a paper invoice – the real benefit of Cimbal goes beyond the handshake technology as the proprietary transaction process allows for much lower fees and swipe away any concept of a swipe fee.

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Brian Solis, a thought-leader in social media made a strong point in his blog entry “The Rise of Social Commerce” – the need to add a 5th “P” to the classic marketing mix (product – price – placement – promotion):  the person. To convert prospects into shoppers and shoppers into paying customers requires more than just special offers that may (or may not) lead to a spike when a store offers a deal too good to ignore.

Brian quotes Lora Cecere’s report on social commerce (Altimeter Group) who sees the evolution of social commerce from participation into “enlightened engagement” – where “companies focus on learning to listen from multiple listening posts (internal and external), aggregating and syndicating shopper reviews, improving engagement through the use of experts and more effectively connecting like shoppers through video content.”

Brian on the 5th P:

Social commerce and social business also require a fifth P, where “people” earn an official representation in the marketing, service and commerce mix. Without connecting the Last Mile of personalization packaged in empathy, we are not able to activate the social effect in and around commerce. As a result of listening, learning, and adapting, we develop more relevant commerce strategies. Through enlightened engagement, we can spark sales and also social shopping, collaboration, and communication.

When you look closely at the photo that Brian added to his blog entry, you see a piece of plastic in the hand of the shopper, the weakest link in the social commerce environment, a one-way payment solution that disrupts the process. And why would this lady stroll through the mall with her card in her hand? Chances are that she holds her smartphone to stay in contact and share her shopping experience.

Replace the card with a phone and not only will the photo look much more realistic, you also add “social payment” to the process – the missing “6th P” to close the loop of social commerce. Cimbal provides this social payment solution on the phone and the integration that raises the value of the other 5 P’s.

To quote Brian: “Without connecting the Last Mile of personalization packaged in empathy, we are not able to activate the social effect in and around commerce.”

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Today is  a great day for Cimbal – after many months of preparation, we made the big step and the press release that announces the launch of the Cimbal software-based “NFC” network crossed the Wire at 7 AM ET. The announcement created quite significant interest and Chris answered media questions all morning.

Read the release here and here. We already have international coverage in Italy and Holland we will update the list as we get additional stories.

You can download the Cimbal Launch release.

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