Category: Featured News

Samsung Pay rolls out in Spain

The mobile payments service has just stepped into the Spanish marketplace through CaixaBank.

Consumers in Spain now have a new opportunity to use mobile payments, as Samsung Pay has rolled out its service in the country, following a deal that has brought it its first support from financial services in the country in the form of ImaginBank, a subsidiary of CaixaBank.

This will make it possible for customers with certain models from the brand to pay using their smartphones.

As of yet, mobile payments have not been tremendously successful in the country. Some banks have already attempted to offer their support to Apple Pay, but when it actually came to enabling the service with their cards and point of service readers, they have appeared to be less motivated. Yet, Samsung Pay has managed to obtain the support of CaixaBank and it has become immediately effective.

A press release has confirmed the partnership between the bank and Samsung Pay for Spanish consumers.

Samsung Pay - Flag of SpainThe bank released the PR in order to reveal that it has become the “key partner” with Samsung in its mobile payments in terms of its “promotional campaign strategy.” In this strategy, there will be 700,000 consumers across the country who will have immediate access to this m-payments service.

The bank has expressed a considerable amount of enthusiasm, which is being seen as a nod to the potential that comes along with mobile payments platforms such as that with which it has just connected itself. When taking into consideration that the bank already owns its own mobile payments service called CaixaBank Pay, which launched last September, it is quite notable that it is as involved as it is in this second option, as well.

The bank stated that supporting Samsung Pay is a demonstration of its dedication to “developing its payment method innovation strategy with the aim of incorporating the latest global trends in its offer.” This is also being seen as a positive move for Samsung’s mobile wallet, which has been working hard to try to keep up in the race against its top rival, Apple Pay. The Apple wallet has also been spreading into new markets worldwide. It’s expected that the service will also be seen in the U.K and China, before long.

Android revenues have brought $31 billion to Google

According to recent reports, the tech giant’s profits from that amount were about $22 billion.

An attorney for Oracle has recently released a figure that has shown that Android revenues for Google since its original launch have been an estimated $31 billion, with $22 billion of that amount consisting of profit.

The figures were released by the lawyer as a part of the lawsuit Oracle has filed against Google.

The report on this issue was originally made by Bloomberg. It stated that within the lawsuit, it is claimed that Google has been using the Java software from Oracle in order to generate its mobile operating system and that it has been generating these Android revenues without having paid for the use of the Java software in the first place. The figures quoted by the lawyer had to do with the earnings that had been generated from a range of different mobile services and products.

The Android revenues included everything from app purchases to ads running on the operating system.

Android Revenues Bring Google BillionsThe figures shared by Oracle were based on internal financial documents from Google and included the earnings from app purchases within the Play store and Google supplied ads that were run on the mobile OS. Google was quite displeased with the fact that Oracle had obtained and openly shared those figures that were meant to remain internal.

Google expressed its displeasure in the form of a request that it made for a redacting of the figures from the public transcript of the case. It said that “Google does not publicly allocate revenues or profits to Android separate and apart from Google’s general business.” The request went on to say that “That non-public financial data is highly sensitive, and public disclosure could have significant negative effects on Google’s business.”

As of the writing of this article, the decision as to whether or not the Android revenues and profits would be redacted from the case’s public transcript had not yet been laid down. It is not yet known whether the figures will be allowed to remain or whether they will indeed be blocked from the public eye. What is known is that the media has already taken hold of the figures published by Bloomberg.