Tag: mobile payments

Mobile commerce growing in the East

PayPal has been making a strong push into the mobile commerce arena recently. The company has long been involved in the world of online payments, but the proliferation of mobile technology has opened up new forms of commerce that PayPal is eager to take advantage of. The company has announced plans to begin expanding its reach across the global mobile commerce market and has set its sights to the East, showing a strong interest in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong sees major activity in mobile commerce sector

Hong Kong is one of the largest economic hubs in the Asian market. Companies with a strong focus on the online world have seen major progress in Hong Kong over the years and companies native to the region have seen aggressive growth in the Philippines, Argentina, South Korea, Sweden, and Russia. PayPal’s Hong Kong division notes that more consumers are relying on their mobile devices to make payments and research products, giving the company an ample opportunity to provide services to these consumers and the businesses of the region.

PayPal expected to increase activity in Hong Kong

Kerry Wong, managing director for PayPal’s operations in Hong Kong, claims that businesses in the region that use the company’s services experienced more growth than their competitors. These companies grew more than the industry average throughout the last 12 months, and many of these businesses have helped increase the regions exports by 2% thanks to the borderless nature of online trading and sales. PayPal expects that companies using its services will continue to see remarkable growth as they begin to embrace mobile commerce more aggressively.

Estimated $20 billion in mobile payments to be processed in 2013

PayPal has high expectations when it comes to online payments in 2013. The company, which boasts of more than 123 million active users worldwide, estimates that it will process over $20 billion in mobile payments globally this year. This is higher than the $14 billion in mobile payments the company processed in 2012.

The two companies have come together to help to turn smartphones in a digital form of wallet.

Samsung and Visa have just announced that they will be working together to help to speed up the worldwide adoption of mobile payments services, by combining their expertise and technology.

This new combined effort will be based on NFC technology that is embedded in certain Samsung devices.

Called the Visa Mobile Provisioning Service, is designed to allow financial institutions to take advantage of transactions using mobile payments account information that is securely downloaded through the use of NFC technology.

Furthermore, the Visa payWave mobile payments applet will be loaded onto Samsung NFC devices.

This will automatically turn smartphones into a mobile payments option for the consumers who purchase them. According to the global head of product at Visa, Jim McCarthy, in a statement, “Samsung devices enabled with Visa payment functionality will no doubt be a powerful product offering — especially in markets where paying with a mobile device is becoming commonplace.”

McCarthy also added that the heart of ensuring that mobile payments become widely available worldwide is to provide financial institutions with a secure way of offering these millions of smartphone carriers with a way to safely store and transmit their account data. He explained that “that is exactly what Visa and Samsung are ready to deliver.”

This is not the first time that Samsung and Visa have worked together on mobile payments initiatives. They previously came together in May 2012 to take part in the trial that was held during the Olympics in London, when the limited edition Galaxy S III smartphone was distributed among the athletes for use during the games. Those phones had the payWave technology built in and allowed the users to register so that they could use the device to for a digital checkout at certain retailers in the city.

The next version of the device, the Galaxy S IV, will have the Visa mobile payments technology built right into it for use with its NFC chip. It is expected to be unveiled on March 14 at a press event.