The Silicon Valley alumni, Max Levchin, the hand behind Paypal's pioneering online security and fraud prevention mechanism, just went trotting his own way to launch his own mobile payments startup- Affirm.

Odd as the move is, Paypal just earned itself a new business rival alongside Square and Slide. However, the catch is that despite working in the same niche, Affirm is aimed to serve a specific "layer of the payment value chain", that is to enhance the conversion of mobile payments.

It is an open fact that Levchin is a prominent investor in Slide. Way back in his San Francisco based tech firm Hard, Valuable, Fun (HVF) tried to sell Slide to Google like Paypal was to eBay.

Paypal, despite its minor customer glitches remains the universally acceptable mod of payments across the world. Precisely due to this factor, added to the fact that smaller firms such as the Klara or even Square are doing pretty well in this arena, will make the road tough for Affirm.

But for starts, the most endearing thing about Affirm is that it cuts down on a lot of hassles during transactions. Levchin says that "We are trying to get as close as possible to one-click, which has always been the case on the desktop". 

Keeping tabs with the developments in mCommerce trends, Affirm demands that users log in through their Facebook accounts for verification. Follow this with two taps on your smartphone - one to tap the Affirm button particating in merchnat websites and second to confirm the offers selected.

However, the risk involved with mobile payments can become a liability for the firm involved in the business if the customers defer from timely payments. The thin dividing line can be a cause for make or break for the reputation of a firm.

To cover this angle, Affirm follows the Amex pattern whereby customers are supposed to settle the pending bills within 30 days.

In a recent interview Max opined that "we started the revolution with PayPal and democratized payments for small businesses, but we stopped short of changing the system.I just think there is so much more to do. Technology has come a long way since PayPal."

We look forward to seeing Affirm in action. working wish his endeavor a lasting success.

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