As mobile payments are gaining momentum,Visa Inc. and MasterCard Inc. are working on new NFC-enabled payments systems. The companies announced at the Mobile World Congress that they set to foster the international expansion of contactless electronic payments that eliminate the need to use a physical credit card at the POS terminals.
MasterCard has unveiled its new MasterPass cloud-based platform, which serves as a single online destination to store card information and can be used to make payments via smartphones and tablet devices at participating venues. For a successful financial transaction, cardholders will have to just tap their NFC-equipped mobile phones to the register or to scan the barcode. The platform, which works with MasterCard credit cards and the cards of other brands, can also be used for making payments online. To make the service even more appealing, MasterCard includes valuable info including account balances, real-time alerts, loyalty programs and more.
The company is rolling out the service gradually across the globe. It will first arrive in Australia and Canada by the end of March, then it will be launched in the US and the UK later this spring and summer, respectively. Other markets including Belgium, Brazil, China, France, Italy, Netherlands, Singapore, Spain and Sweden will get access to the platform later in 2013. To make the new service available to more users, MasterCard partnered with VeriFone Systems Inc., a maker of payment terminals, and mFoundry Inc., a developer of mobile-banking apps.
“Every device is becoming a shopping device,” commented Ed McLaughlin, chief emerging payments officer, MasterCard, in the press-note. “MasterPass brings together all of the ways we pay for things, from traditional plastic cards to digital wallets, and gives consumers the ability to make a payment from wherever they are and with one simple experience.”
Pic.: A snapshot from the MasterPass page
At the same time, Visa has launched its Visa Ready Partner Program to help intergrate its payment technologies into smartphones and tablets. It follows the launch of V.me, Visa’s digital wallet platform, in fall 2012. The new initiative is designed to help companies, engaged in supporting mobile payments—device manufacturers, technology partners, mobile network operators, etc.,—to get a quicker access to Visa’s payment gateways. The devices that comply with the new mobile payments requirements will feature a special Visa Ready symbol.
Just like MasterCard, Visa has teamed up with technology developers to help its program spread wider. Visa has signed a deal with Ingenico-owned Roam, manufacturer of mobile credit-card readers. In addition, Visa has partnered with Samsung—as part of this collaboration, the tech giant will integrate Visa PayWave technology into some of its new NFC-enabled smartphones. Still, for its successful rollout across the USA, the country’s major wireless operators yet have to support this endeavor. Previously, some of them haven’t been very nice to NFC-based mobile payment technology—for instance, Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile block the Google Wallet.
Pic.: The Visa Ready symbol
The era of mobile payments is coming. In its latest blog post, Euromonitor International analyst writes that “m-commerce will grow 386% from 2012-2017 to about US$400 billion worldwide in 2017. More mobile transactions mean more cashless transactions, which is ultimately the goal for payment titans like Visa and MasterCard. Although Visa and MasterCard process almost 60% of the US$13.8 trillion card transactions in 2012, what both want is a piece of the US$14.9 that was conducted in cash payments in 2012.”