- October 17, 2010
- Global Payments Knowledge
- No Comments
- Blackberry, ElectraCard, EMV, infrastructure, iPhone, MasterCard, mobile, OPUS, payments
Clearly the expected market movement of Autumn is upon us.
Currently we are seeing two themes emerge. Firstly, mobile/”easy device” payments methods are hitting the news from many varied sources and angles. These range from new methods such as iPhone and Blackberry payments, through to the continual geographical emergence of pilots and major growth in places like Korea. The second theme is that more traditional mass methods are still gaining major traction; exemplified by more potential EMV traction in the US, this time by the US Department of Defence, and an interesting move by MasterCard to purchase 12.5% of ElectraCard, an OPUS Company based in India, who produce card processing infrastructure software amongst other things.
These two themes seem to be competing, with potential for convergence which leads to the question around the future roadmap: Will today’s mass card processing methods diminish through popular rise in alternative methods, or will the alternatives hit business case and security ceilings before they become mass, and are then converted over into more traditional compromises?