Cambridge-based mobile payments powerhouse Bango is ramping its technology to increase by tenfold the amount of end user spend its platform is comfortably able to cope with.

The current £5 billion EUS capacity could be scaled to as much as £50bn as Bango continues to evolve the platform, CEO Ray Anderson revealed to Business Weekly.

Anderson (pictured) also disclosed significant expansion of Bango’s capability in Asia where it has already grown its Japan office and its team in Korea. Expect to see an uptick in other key centres such as Taiwan and Singapore. 

Bango is already growing its influence in India through its client Amazon and has a strong European springboard from its offices in Milan following the acquisition of Italian-quoted business Audiens.

Bango powers mobile payments around the globe for online stores such as Google, Amazon, Samsung, Microsoft and other key operators. They use the Bango Platform to collect payments from tens of millions of customers.
The company’s first half results to June 30 showed an inexorable march towards profit in 2019 without exhausting current cash in hand; the payments business is already EBITDA positive.

End user spend in the first half increased 138 per cent to £220m; total revenues increased 54 per cent to £2.63m.

Bango has £5.88m cash which Anderson expects will fund the group through to profitability and cash generation. He said the war chest was sufficient to support both planned investment to grow sales and develop new products.

In the first half, Bango expanded the use of billing integration technology, enabling customers to sign-up for Amazon Prime Video in the US, UK and India.

Pandora, a leading music streaming service, chose the Bango Platform for mobile operator launch in the US.

Additional Google Play routes in Africa and South America were opened up and Anderson sees these as high growth territories along with Asia.

The business model Bango has evolved ranks alongside those of other Cambridge enterprises that have shown long-term sustainability, notably Marshall, Domino, Arm and more recently Grapeshot.

Anderson said: “We work hard to ensure we deliver what we say we will deliver. And I am sure investors are encouraged by the fact we refuse to rest on our laurels; we are constantly evolving our technology to improve our offering to customers and expand our client base globally.”

Mobile operators around the world are seeing the substantial additional profit they can make by working with Bango. An increasing number are expected to upgrade to Bango in the coming months.  

For its part, Bango is able to control spend by improving its technology to leverage efficiencies rather than pile on headcount. While its workforce is ethnically diverse the company is in the talent stakes rather than a numbers game. 

“We have managed to recruit a number of non-UK hires to boost our talent pool but that is the key – to improve our staff not just put bums on seats. Our continuous technology upgrades enable us to invest wisely in the things that will improve service to clients and make Bango stronger,” Anderson told me.