i-movo, which provides secure digital voucher systems, is working with Wapple to create barcode vouchers that are delivered to mobile phones and can be redeemed at retail outlets across the UK.
Brands such as The Evening Standard, Wild Bean Caf and The Daily Mail have already used i-movo digital voucher technology. But until now, some 30,000 retailers across the UK involved in the scheme had to type in a unique code sent to the customer's phone via SMS.
Wapples solution uses the companys new XML-based mark-up language, WAPL (Wapple Application Programming Language), which enables the rapid development and deployment of genuine device-independent applications.
Using WAPL, the digital barcodes can be delivered to, optimised and displayed accurately on over 50,000 different mobile phones and devices using the mobile Iinternet for easy scanning and redemption at the point of sale
Simply being able to scan barcodes directly from a mobile device fully automates our voucher redemption process and is much faster for retailers to use,” says i-movo CEO, David Tymm. Our traditional strength in understanding in real-time who is using the vouchers, where and when, remains.
One of the main problems i-movo faced was making sure that the barcode vouchers could be displayed accurately on any mobile phone, with so many different variations of screen size, hardware and software. In addition, clients had asked how brands could be better represented on mobile devices by displaying full colour logos and photographs, for example.
We wanted to develop an 'enhanced' version of our Secure Digital Vouchers, but our experience was that MMS and picture messages do not display consistently across handsets and do not work at all on devices like the iPhone and Blackberry, says Tymm. If a barcode is in any way corrupted or distorted it won't scan, so it appeared an impossible task.
Using WAPL and the Wapple Exhibit device profiling technology, however, has enabled i-movo to achieve its objectives.