Innovations in mobile payment services have generated new opportunities worldwide, says TrendForce.

The global mobile payment market will reach US $780 billion by the end of 2017, amounting to an annual increase of 25.8%.

This is according to market research firm TrendForce, which notes mobile payment services expanded significantly during 2016 as smartphone makers intensify their efforts to build their own payment ecosystems. At the same time, innovations and diversification in mobile payment services have generated new demand and opportunities worldwide, says Trendforce.

"Among the smartphone makers that are also developing their mobile payment businesses, Apple and Samsung are two brands that have an advantage over their competitors," says Kelly Hsieh, senior research manager of TrendForce.

"Since Android has over 50% of the mobile OS market share worldwide, Google also has an opportunity to build up an extensive mobile payment ecosystem. Google has recently accelerated the international expansion of its digital wallet platform Android Pay and made a big step forward this December by announcing partnership with major Japanese e-commerce and Internet company Rakuten."

This year will also see significant progress being made on the development of security solutions for mobile payment, observes Hsieh. In addition to the ongoing integration of different hardware technologies in encrypted chip design, she continues, advances in encryption algorithms and multi-factor authentication methods will increase efficiency in user verification, payment confirmation and secure data transfer.

A report from Juniper Research reveals the value of domestic money transfers, including operator money and social media money services, will reach $520 billion in global mobile transactions by 2018, up nearly 200% from an estimated $178 billion last year.

The Juniper study notes person-to-person domestic transfers, such as M-Pesa, Airtel Money, Orange Money and MTN Mobile Money, will increase by 45%, showing higher usage in developing markets. This will be supplemented by users making social media transfers in developed markets via services such as Venmo and WeChat.

According to Juniper, in 2015, Africa and Middle East had 235 million registered mobile money users, representing the largest share of the global market.