San Diego-based Mitek has announced it will debut what it iscalling Mobile Photo Account Opening on Tuesday at Finovate in New York.

Known for its products centered on mobile remote deposit capture– where it provides technology to many leading banks and creditunions – Mitek has been on the hunt for more ways to leverage itsimaging patents and the robust photography capabilities onsmartphones.

In that vein, last year Mitek rolled out Photo Bill Pay, intended to let consumers pay bills by snappingpictures of them.

The rationale for the account opening: “It solves a real painpoint,” said Scott Carter, Mitek's chief marketing officer, in aninterview.

“It's a horrible experience, applying for a checking account ona mobile device,” he added. “There's a lot of abandonment – atleast 25%, some institutions report over 50%.”

The problem is that inputting lots of data on a phone is tough,between the small keys on glass and the tiny screen size.

Thus the Mitek idea of using the phone's camera for dataentry. “A picture is worth a thousand keystrokes,” saidCarter. “Snap a picture of a driver's license and that can populatea lot of the application.”

“We can bring in other types of forms such as a W2,” saidCarter.

He added that the cherry on this sundae is that “the consumercan fund the account by snapping a picture of the front and back ofa check.”

Carter estimated that applying for an account this way willtypically “take under one minute.”

As with other Mitek products, Mobile Photo Account Opening willprimarily be sold through the company's channel partners, with Mitek handling direct sales to a select group ofinstitutions.

Carter explained the product's pricing this way: “We will havean annual license fee, but the majority of the pricing will be pertransaction. That will be important to small credit unions.”