Paris-headquartered microtransaction company Hi-Media Payments announced the opening of a new San Francisco office, as well as plans to bring its Allopass micropayments platform to the North Aemrican market. The new branch, Hi-media USA, will be headed by CEO Pooj and will service U.S. customers and their clients. Its initial U.S. customers include Artix Entertainment, Gambit, gWallet, and Sometrics.

Hi-Media works with a variety of companies that sell virtual goods or digital content such as social networks, dating sites, streaming media firms, and developers of social games, MMOs, and virtual worlds. Its Allopass platform currently processes over eight million transactions per month. It supports nine different payment methods like credit cards, mobile payments, home phone billing, and third-party prepaid cards.

The company offers localized payment methods, which it says reduces or avoids friction in the checkout process, leading to higher completion rates and generating more paying customers than credit cards alone. Hi-Media also claims that Allopass is the only micropayment platform that offers merchant settlement in less than ten days, which it says is "a significant advantage" for companies that can't afford to wait up to 60 days to get paid.

"We know micropayments," says Preena, "and after almost a decade working with thousands of online merchants around the world, we have a firm understanding of what it takes to make payments friction-free while offering merchants more options along with fast and efficient payback."