VISA pays $190M in cash for PlaySpan

PlaySpan Monetization-as-a-Service (MaaS)TM platform

Started by a 12 year old, PlaySpan was purchased by VISA, which along with the $2B purchase of CyberSource, extends the company’s presences in the digital and mobile commerce space.

From Techcrunch: “PlaySpan’s flagship product UltimatePay is a ‘Monetization as a Service’ platform for apps, games, videos and digital goods. Based on the user’s location, the payments platform draws from over 85 different payment options. Because of its vast variety of payment options (which include PayPal, pre-paid cards, and a number of credit cards), UltimatePay is designed for a global audience. Currently, PlaySpan powers virtual goods marketplaces across 1,000 video games, virtual world publishers and social networks.”

From the press release: “Within the eCommerce category, PlaySpan is a leader in the relatively new segment of digital goods, which generated an estimated $25 billion in consumer spending globally in 2010, a figure expected to reach $280 billion by 2014.