Vodafone , together with Sumitomo Corporation ’s Economy of Things business, has partnered with Mastercard to enable operators to further advance the Economy of Things (EoT). As part of their collaboration, Vodafone, Sumitomo, and Mastercard intend to enable fleet, freight, shipping, and logistics operators to authorise machines to trade with other machines on their behalf.

Also, the partnership includes a new service which connects Pairpoint’s platform with Mastercard Gateway, enabling fleet operators’ vehicles to conduct approved direct payments at charging or fuel stations, while freight companies can support payments for pre-authorised connections along a route, including port charges, and handling and storage, among others. Launched in November 2023 by Vodafone and Sumitomo Corporation, Pairpoint was set to allow customers and businesses to benefit from the advantages and growing opportunities of the Economy of Things. In addition, the brand intended to offer a safe environment in which devices, machines, and vehicles could securely transact with each other without human intervention but having the owner in complete control. Payment solutions advancing the Economy of Things When commenting on the announcement, representatives from Pairpoint underlined that, through the partnership between Vodafone, Sumitomo, and Mastercard, the companies intend to provide customers with a secure and simplified way to authorise their machines to conduct online transactions while also generating additional growth opportunities for businesses and scaling the integration of the Internet of Things (IoT) and blockchains. Moreover, Pairpoint-enabled devices are set to be assigned standards-based digital identities stored within their SIMs, which the company can then leverage to allow interactions and trades with other permissioned devices on its platform.

The solution follows existing IoT technology that assists unattended connected devices in transmitting and receiving data, supporting, for example, a shipping container in autonomously reporting its weight and free capacity. In addition, the new service is set to be globally scalable, available to all telecommunications players, and support payment credentials functioning on all major card networks. As per the information detailed in the press release, the solution is set to become available in the UK by the end of 2024, with a progressive roll-out across Europe to follow. The partnership between the three companies utilises the geographical scale of Vodafone’s global IoT platform, as well as Sumitomo’s industrial capabilities in 66 countries and regions.

At the same time, the collaboration uses Mastercard Gateway’s payment acceptance solution which connects over 200 financial institutions across over 80 markets globally. .