San Francisco-based mobile-payments provider Boku has raised $35 million in a funding round, thanks in big part to investor Telefónica Digital. Other investors include Andreessen Horowitz, Benchmark Capital, New Enterprise Associates, Khosla Ventures and Index Ventures, the Financial Times reported.
Boku is one of a number of companies gobbling up as much capital as possible in the mobile-payments race, a fast growing competition among startups, major telcos, banks and more.
Boku, which has agreements with 250 wireless operators around the globe, lets you make purchases with your cell phone and pay for things at merchants by using near-field communications (NFC) via your device.
Telefónica has been very active in mobile-payments projects. It's working on a joint platform with two of the U.K.'s largest mobile operators and has formed a partnership with Visa to set up merchants in Barcelona with devices that can read NFC chips.
Boku has now raised $75 million since 2008.
