The system, which he developed after noting that our primary form of communication was being sidelined by the internet, has been designed and tested to ensure that it will not recognise a recording of your voice or someone trying to mimic it. Impressionist Rory Bremner was even enrolled to test the technology. "The only person that can use the system is you," Ogden says.

Just to be sure, Voice Commerce puts biometric data gathered from a recording of a customer's voice that information together with other data, such as the user's geographical location and transactional history, to guard against fraud.

Ogden says the VoicePay system, which is being sold for use by financial companies, will have over 100 banks signed up by the end of next year.

The plan is to tap demand for mobile phone-based financial services. As banks nervously consider how to enter the market, which has three times the potential number of users of the internet, Ogden is offering to set up joint ventures where risk is shared. Ogden says: "For mobile payments this is the only solution, in my view, that makes sense. No software is required by the retail customer and it works today on any network in the world."

He admits that his timetable has been set back slightly by the convulsions in the global economy over the last year, but he says the company could benefit from banks' reassessments of their customer relationships in the light of the crisis.

Ogden's ability to spot a new technological trend has certainly proved itself so far. While working for Sony on the development of electronic books in the early 1990s he came across one of the first internet browsers, Mosaic. That led him to set up the internet in the Channel Islands and then move on to create Europe's first internet shop, Wine Warehouse. He then helped set up BarclaySquare, a kind of online shopping mall, for Barclays Bank before developing the WorldPay concept in 1997.

WorldPay proved his first real paydirt, becoming a $2bn (£1.33bn) turnover company by 2002. But that moment of success turned into Ogden's biggest business disappointment after a bitter £40m hostile takeover by Royal Bank of Scotland. Ogden blames "bad legal advice" for the debacle but he says: "What goes around comes around or Not a Penny More, Not a Penny Less – that's the film version."

He says that Voice Commerce Group has now basically rebuilt and surpassed WorldPay, as he has been able to recreate many of his former company's capabilities with a new twist. "This company is substantially better than WorldPay," he says. "We have far greater control and the benefit of the learning experience."

After leaving Worldpay, Ogden spent five years and $10m researching and developing the verbal signature idea, mostly funded by his own money and that of two former colleagues from WorldPay. They have not only developed the voice recognition system in partnership with specialist company Nuance, but also set up local dial-in capabilities in 51 countries.

Earlier this year Thule, an Icelandic investment vehicle, took a 20 percent stake in the business,valuing the enterprise at £10m.

With the business set to take off in 2009 the next step is a market listing.

"Our plan is to get the company into profitability as quickly as we can and seek an IPO, potentially in the next six months," Ogden says, "We have just become regulated by the UK's Financial Services Authority and similar moves are afoot elsewhere in the world."  Ogden says the likely float will not be about fund raising but about ensuring the company is as transparent as possible, something he sees as important for a business so involved in consumers' financial security. He says he is not particularly concerned about launching onto the public markets in the current turmoil, given that he does not intend to raise cash "We are comfortable with our position if we IPO in six to nine months," he says.

Having lost one baby in WorldPay, Ogden is also keen to stay involved with Voice Commerce and shepherd the company into the next phase of growth. He says: "I want to be a part of it growing up. Why would I exit now when all the hard work has been done?"