Calcutta, July 7: SBI Card is looking to co-brand credit cards with more banks and exploring the possibility of using mobiles as credit cards.

At present, the credit card arm of the country's largest lender State Bank of India has co-branding with Karur Vysya Bank, Bank of Maharashtra, Oriental Bank of Commerce, Federal Bank and Lakshmi Vilas Bank.

According to SBI Card officials, co-branding helps small banks to offer card facilities to its customers.

"We are talking to several other banks to co-brand credit cards," Vijay Jasuja, CEO of SBI Card, said at the launch of its premium credit card - Elite - aimed at affluent consumers.

SBI Elite is the first card of the company on MasterCard World platform.

He said since SBI Card was a separate company, it was able to co-brand with other banks. Others do not have that advantage as they operate from their own credit card division.

SBI Card is looking to introduce a digital credit card, which will allow users to use mobile phones to make payments.

The rollout is expected by the next fiscal. "We are in discussion with a few vendors," Jasuja said.

Known as host card emulation, near field communication would be used to make contact-less payments.

The decision to go digital with credit cards comes at a time prepaid payment technologies such as mobile wallets are gaining traction among users. The RBI has set of a limit of Rs 2,000 per transaction across all categories of merchants for contact-less payments.

SBI Card has a market share of 15 per cent with a 3.75-million customer base and plans to acquire about one million new credit card customers this fiscal.

Jasuja said the SBI is likely to finalise a replacement for GE Capital, its joint venture partner in SBI Card, by September. While GE Capital Business Process Management Services takes care of the back-end technology and processing needs in the existing joint venture, SBI Cards and Payment Services focuses on customer acquisition, marketing and risk management.