payments

SAN FRANCISCO--For a guy who's done his share of industry disrupting, Jack Dorsey is sure eager to opine on tech's softer side.

Today at GigaOm's RoadMap conference here, Dorsey took the stage for nearly half an hour and dished mostly about love, empathy, hyper-personalization, fun and whimsy--as it relates to tech of course.

And why not?

As Twitter's co-founder and Square's CEO, Dorsey, 34, is a sort of bon vivant of entrepreneurship. With his hip styling and pithy and sober delivery, he looks and talks the part. As he straddles leadership roles at two of … Read more

Michael Abbott, the CEO of carrier-backed mobile payments joint venture Isis, has an interesting take on rival Google Wallet: "It's the best thing that could happen."

That's not the sort of thing you would expect to hear from the head of a venture that is planning to roll out its own mobile-payment system, designed to allow consumers to tap their phone on special terminals to pay for goods. Abbott, however, holds a longer-term view of the business, and believes that the entry by multiple parties is a good thing. It generates greater consumer awareness, stirs the … Read more

American Express plans to dabble in mobile payments and other forms of digital commerce at an arm's length, preferring to throw cash at startups rather than launch its own major initiatives.

The company said today that it will invest $100 million in startups that are designed to address mobile and online payments, security, reward and loyalty programs, and other forms of digital commerce.

This represents American Express's primary stab at the booming digital-commerce business, a potentially lucrative area that has a large number of players all vying for position. American Express's low-key approach stands in contrast to … Read more

BilltoMobile has been on a roll recently.

The company, which handles purchases of digital goods that customers make on their phone by linking payment to their cell phone bill, just last month signed AT&T as a partner, locking up the fourth and last national wireless carrier. BilltoMobile CEO Jim Greenwell said that the industry is poised to see a rapid explosion of purchases made through the carrier billing model. Rather than enter the credit card information on the phone, a person can use this option to pay for the good and have the expense show up on their … Read more

Google today launched a new set of capabilities to its mobile payment service that it hopes will draw in more early adopters.

Customers can use their Google Wallet-armed smartphones to redeem coupons and earn rewards points, something it calls the SingleTap experience.

The new feature marks the first major enhancement since the summer launch of Google Wallet, which enabled consumers to pay for goods and services by waving their smartphones at special payment terminals found in drug stores, retailers, taxis, and some train stations.

Google has been aggressively pushing the service as it attempts to take an early, dominant role … Read more

SAN DIEGO--While the mobile-payment players acknowledge that partnerships are necessary for long-term viability, many are gearing up for some chaotic times.

The idea of a digital wallet and the opportunities that come from moving payments onto the smartphone were major themes at the CTIA Enterprise & Application show. American Express executive Dan Schulman used his keynote address to call for more alliances, noting that, "no single company can do this alone." The prospect of mobile payments was also the focus of one of the more prominent panel discussions today.

It's not hard to see why. Beyond getting … Read more

SAN DIEGO--No single company can catapult mobile payments into mainstream use, said American Express executive Dan Schulman, who called for more partnerships between the financial and wireless worlds.

"All of us need to play together," Schulman said today during his keynote address at the CTIA Enterprise & Applications show. "All of us have strengths and capabilities we bring to the table."

Schulman himself straddles both worlds. He is the group president of American Express' enterprise growth unit, which is responsible for mobile payments. Prior to that, he ran Virgin Mobile USA and Sprint Nextel's prepaid, … Read more

The mobile-payments joint venture between three of the national wireless carriers has gotten the support of nearly all of the major handset manufacturers in its bid to enable consumers to make purchases by waving their phones.

Isis--which is made up of AT&T, Verizon Wireless, and T-Mobile USA--said today that HTC, LG Electronics, Motorola Mobility, Research In Motion, Samsung Electronics, and Sony Ericsson will ship devices using the joint venture's technology standard for near-field communication, which enables the tap-and-go payment capability. The alliance, however, is missing a key player in Apple.

A spokesman for Isis said the venture … Read more

Google Wallet, which will allow people to tap or swipe their phones to pay for things, officially launches today on its first smartphone, the Samsung Nexus S offered on Sprint Nextel.

While several other companies, including credit card giants Visa and American Express, as well as mobile wireless carriers, have also announced plans to launch their own digital wallets, Google is the first to take its digital wallet to market.

Citibank, MasterCard, and Sprint are the initial launch partners for the service. What this means for users is that, initially, virtually the only credit cards that will work with Google Wallet are Citibank MasterCards. Google is also offering a Google Prepaid MasterCard as well, a workaround for people who may not have a Citibank MasterCard. People who want to use this card can preload money from other credit cards onto the Google prepaid card. And then they can make purchases using the phone.

Sprint is the first official carrier partner since it is the carrier offering the Nexus S 4G. But as other Android smartphones equipped with NFC (near-field communications) technology come on the market, other devices on other carriers will eventually be able to use the service too.

Google also said today that it has licensed NFC technology from other major credit card companies: American Express, Visa, and Discover. This means that upcoming versions of Google Wallet will support those credit cards as well.

"In the future, our goal is to make it possible for you to add all of your payment cards to Google Wallet, so you can say goodbye to even the biggest traditional wallets," said Osama Bedier, vice president of payments at Google.… Read more