Tag: samsung mobile payments

Formerly loyal customers are switching brands with each new service and product unveiling.

As the device battle rages on between Apple and Samsung, the mobile payments market is becoming a central battleground for the device manufacturers, as they pull out all the stops to draw consumers to not only their iPhones and Galaxies, but to their smartphone wallets, too.

Though iPhones are generally considered the industry head, it is Samsung that is leading the way.

The Korean electronics company features a broad range of Galaxy devices, available at different price points. This has made it the global leader with a recently reported market share of 29 percent in the 2012 fourth quarter. This is a massive increase over 2010’s market share, which was 8 percent. Apple is holding steady with a market share of 21.8 percent as of the same period of time.

As the two companies battle over device sales, mobile payments have also become an area for competition.

At the moment, these two companies appear to be each others’ greatest competitive threat both in device sales and mobile payments use. The primary battle is to be able to keep up with the latest in innovation, or it will be very easy to fall behind. This has also involved a number of attacks from within the companies.

For instance, on the day before the Samsung Galaxy 4S was unveiled, Phil Schiller, the chief marketing officer at Apple, gave one of his very rare interviews to the media, in which he openly criticized the “fragmented” software at Android, and on the Samsung devices, themselves.

This type of battle is expected to become even more fierce, say analysts, as the saturation point of the smartphone marketplace, and now the mobile payments market, approaches. This will mean that the growth of the companies will be driven primarily by stealing customers from one another, as opposed to trying to find customers that have not yet been reached.

That said, as much as Apple can criticize, author Clyde Prestowitz (of “Three Billion New Capitalists: The Great Shift of Wealth and Power to the East” fame), pointed out that in both device sales and mobile payments, “Samsung is very dangerous for Apple”.

Samsung introduces new mobile commerce application

Samsung has begun showing off its new Wallet mobile application for its line of smartphones. The company has adopted a strong interest mobile commerce recently, and this interest has helped the company dethrone Apple as the leading provider of mobile devices in the world. Consumers share the enthusiasm for mobile commerce that Samsung has been displaying, demanding new applications that can facilitate mobile payments and make it easier to manage bank accounts and shop online.

Wallet to provide digital storage to consumers

Samsung’s Wallet will act in much the same way that other mobile wallets do. The Wallet will be able to store a wide variety of digital information and content, such as financial data and tickets for concerts or public transport. In this way, the Wallet is very similar to Apple’s Passbook. Unlike the Passbook, the Wallet will allow users to participate in mobile commerce in some way, thanks to the NFC capabilities of Samsung’s latest smartphones.

Wallet to make use of QR codes

While the Wallet will leverage NFC to some degree to open up mobile commerce to consumers, the other aspects of the application will be based on barcodes, specifically QR codes. The Wallet can store mobile coupons, airline tickets, and special offers from loyalty programs that can all be accessed through scanning a QR code. Samsung believes that these codes are a simpler way of providing services to consumers rather than having the Wallet rely entirely on NFC technology.

Wallet may be included in new Galaxy S4

Samsung has already lined up an array of partners that will support the Wallet when it is launched. The company is currently preparing for the launch of the new Galaxy S4, which is expected to be released in spring this year. The Wallet may be made available before the launch of the S4, with current speculation suggesting that the application will be available in a matter of weeks rather than months.