As we all know, Facebook is rolling out Facebook Credits in the near future, allowing for microtransaction payments to various games and services within the site. Though the site promises that the credits won’t be a main source of income for it, they are still an important part of the emerging Facebook economy.
With a good amount of the Facebook user base coming from Asia, Malaysian payments company MOL has entered the picture to help the growing market. In a just-announced partnership with Facebook, MOL will be providing sources for Facebook Credit purchases within physical stores across Asia, Australia and New Zealand.
Of course, as our Asian readers will note, the importance of this comes from having an alternative outlet from which to buy Facebook Credits without the need for a credit card. Some 500,000 outlets will sell the credits through MOL, offering co-branded gift cards for storage.
MOL, which acquired Friendster in the earlier part of 2010, had this to say:
“The relationship with Facebook demonstrates MOL’s growing role as a leading payment provider for social networking sites in Asia, especially in our core countries of Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Philippines, Thailand and India. Over the last few quarters, we have seen a double-digit increase in payment transactions and payment volume. This partnership continues MOL’s momentum to build the largest end-to-end content, distribution and commerce network in Asia.”
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We will surely hear more about this as time moves forward and we begin to see more interaction with the Facebook credits system. But for the Asian market, this is an answer to a question that hadn’t yet had the chance to be asked.
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