The Month of Mobile!
July may have been the hottest month on record in the U.S., but August turned out to be a sizzling month of mobile payments news that will change the landscape and accelerate the adoption rate. In the short time we have been blogging, we already talked mobile in two posts, Consumer Adoption of Mobile Payments andChannel Shifts. With so many big announcements, we just couldn’t ignore it – especially when one of them involves the fuel that keeps this blog going, coffee!
Square & Starbucks
Square, a mobile card reading and payment company, announced a big partnership with Starbucks, giving it access to nearly 7,000 locations and millions of loyal Starbucks customers, and instant legitimacy as a national mobile payments player. It could get really interesting if Starbucks integrates their prepaid card/loyalty program that has processed 2.4 billion transactions worth $10.2 billion from 2006 to July 1st of this year.
PayPal & Discover
PayPal, the long-time market leader in on-line payments, and Discover expanded their relationship this month in an agreement that will allow PayPal’s mobile wallet to be accepted at more than seven million merchants though Discover’s network starting in the spring of 2013.
Updated Google Wallet
Google released plans for an updated version of its cloud-based wallet. Notable enhancements include the full integration of offers, payments and loyalty programs (?) to the platform. For example, merchants can send shopper’s real-time coupons based on GPS location or use I.D. verification to allow consumers to check into flights. Although the full version of the wallet is limited to select carriers and phones with near field communications, the platform’s ability to carry cards from multiple issuers could be a key competitive advantage.
