A contactless boarding pass system is set to reduce waiting times and create a better travel experience for passengers at India’s airports, according to air transport technology giant SITA.

SITA is installing its Smart Path technology across nine Indian airports in a partnership with Airports Authority of India (AAI). Part of the wider DigiYatra initiative, the collaboration introduces SITA’s contactless boarding pass system to reduce waiting times, creating a seamless travel experience for passengers, and improves airport efficiency for every traveller.

DigiYatra is an industry-led initiative that uses facial recognition technology to make terminal entry and security clearance at an airport a seamless, hassle-free, and paperless process. DigiYatra is a decentralised mobile-based ID storage platform where air travellers can save their IDs and travel documents.

AAI will use SITA’s products and solutions, including SITA Smart Path, Passenger Flow Management (PFM) solution and Face Pods. These technologies offer biometric solutions at most touchpoints across the airport, meaning a contact-free travel experience across nine Indian airports.

SITA says its biometric technology will transform the way travellers navigate through Indian airports. Sumesh Patel, President, APAC, SITA says: « It is vital in this connected era that travel across the globe is as seamless as possible, and we are ready to help India continue to innovate in their digitalisation efforts with SITA technology as the DigiYatra initiative spreads across India. »

In 2023, over 20 million users experienced DigiYatra, and with its upcoming availability at 28 Indian airports, DigiYatra aims to cover approximately 90% of India’s domestic flying population. The Ministry of Civil Aviation-led DigiYatra Foundation plans to align with the International Air Transport Association (IATA)’s One ID initiative for global interoperability, further improving the seamless travel experience.

In July 2023, SITA announced a deal with AAI to provide technology to 43 of India’s biggest airports. The deal will see improvements to over 2,700 passenger touchpoints, signifying one of the largest deployments for passenger processing.

SITA has been working with the Indian government since 1952 and is a supporter of the Make In India initiative.

SITA, or Société Internationale de Télécommunications Aéronautiques, was founded in 1949 by eleven airlines in order to bring about shared infrastructure cost efficiency by combining their communications networks.

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This Industry Viewpoint was authored by Dario Betti, CEO of the Mobile Ecosystem Forum

The UK government wants to crackdown on “snatch thefts” of smartphones; an estimated 78,000 Brits had their phones stolen on the streets in the year up to March 2024 – a rise of over 150% compared to the previous 12 months. The government wants a technology solution, but technology by itself might not be able to address the root cause. … [visit site to read more]

Safaricom and Mastercard announced on Thursday that they have signed a partnership to accelerate adoption of payment acceptance and cross-border remittance services in Kenya.

Under the terms of the partnership, Safaricom will embed Mastercard’s omnichannel acceptance solutions for the 636,000 merchants using Safaricom’s mobile money service M-Pesa.

Safaricom said that combining M-Pesa’s extensive merchant network and Mastercard’s global payment infrastructure will scale digital payments across Kenya by making more seamless, secure, and scalable payment solutions available to merchants. That in turn would also enable them to serve customers across global markets.

The partnership will also boost remittance services, streamlining cross-border transactions efficiently, said Safaricom’s chief financial services officer Esther Waititu.

“This collaboration with Mastercard unlocks new opportunities for M-Pesa merchants,” Waititu said in a statement. “By combining our expertise with Mastercard’s global acceptance network, we are enabling businesses to provide more efficient and frictionless payment solutions to their customers, both in Kenya and beyond.”

According to analyst firm GlobalData, Kenya’s mobile wallet payments market has grown at a rate of 12.7% CAGR between 2020 and 2024, driven by a rise in consumer spending and a high consumer preference for mobile-based payments. GlobalData is forecasting 5.7% growth in 2024 to reach KES8.4 trillion (US$60.1 billion).

The firm credits  mobile wallet growth in Kenya to several factors, from the popularity of M-Pesa to the rising popularity of QR code-based payments, which itself has been helped along by the introduction of the Kenya Quick Response Code (KE-QR Code) Standard last year.

As of July 2024, M-Pesa had over 51 million customers.

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Four bits of expansion news, two domestic and two international: … [visit site to read more]

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Four bits of international news: … [visit site to read more]