Coin Currency News Est. 2014

UpChannel’s Crypto Wallets to be Preinstalled on 29 Million Smartphones in 2018, Surpasses 2000% Growth in Q1

By helping telecom partners in emerging markets connect with their customers, UpChannel grows to more than 29 million smartphones and is adding blockchain technology to the product offering

UpChannel Connect, the free, white-labeled CRM platform for telecom carriers and smartphone manufacturers in emerging markets, has executed agreements that grow their device count from 1.2 million devices at the beginning of 2018, to over 29 million under contract at the end of Q1, representing growth of more than 2000%.

As an example of its market penetration in 105 countries, UpChannel Connect is currently installed on almost 3% of all phones in Uruguay and nearly 5% of all phones in Samoa.

With smartphone prices in emerging markets dropping below $30 USD, people are transitioning from old flip phones, going directly to smartphones and leapfrogging the PC altogether. The unexpected result for telecoms, however, is higher support costs and an increase in returned devices.

With UpChannel Connect, which consists of a web-based dashboard for telecom support staff and a custom, white-labeled app that gets preinstalled on all smartphones sold, telecom partners can solve these problems.

The resulting benefits for UpChannel’s telecom partners, which include mPhone, Plum Mobile, and TM Cell, and more, are device and user insights, additional revenue, and reduced support costs, all at no charge to the telecom carrier or manufacturer.

By adding blockchain technology, which will include a cryptocurrency wallet and curated dApp marketplace, to its current white-labeled platform, UpChannel aims to be one of the world’s largest providers of cryptocurrency wallets.

Ron Williams, the CEO of UpChannel, said, “The fact that we’ve almost reached our 2018 end-of-year goal in Q1 shows UpChannel is rapidly being embraced by telecoms in emerging markets. With a majority of people in these markets being largely unbanked, we have the opportunity to bring equal access to markets and services, through blockchain technology.

“And with the dApps in our marketplace, we can introduce tools like messaging, identity services, voting capabilities, mesh networking, and much more. These are all things most people in emerging markets haven’t had access to before. Blockchain is truly life-changing technology for them.“

With its status as a trusted technology partner to telecom carriers and manufacturers, its growing reach to 10’s of millions of people, and its concentration on emerging markets, UpChannel is positioned to be a serious contender in the burgeoning cryptocurrency space.

Currently raising a Series A of up to $4 million USD, UpChannel will use the funds to continue connecting telecoms with their customers, bridge the gap between unbanked people and financial services, and bring equal access to the global market.