The two companies today announced a partnership in which Samsung would consider Visa payWave mobile payment applet in future devices as well as the use of visas to make it easier for customers to attach their phones for Samsung financial institution account and Visa.
Although not specifically mentioned, the S4 Galaxy ahead will be the flagship for the Visa program, according to a person familiar with the partnership. Samsung will be part of the Visa Ready Partner Program, which was announced Friday. The program is designed to expedite the approval and authorization of payment systems Visa endorsed on different devices, including smartphones.
Visa has spent the last years building its own digital wallet, one of the many players who try to revive the trend of mobile payments. With the adoption of mobile payments - the idea of paying for goods and services by waving your phone at a cash register - still slow in the U.S. and other mature markets, companies have worked hard to implement the infrastructure and partnerships.
"This is a global alliance," Bill Gadja, head of Visa's mobile products, said in an interview. "We are excited to announce other programs with Samsung."
Samsung Electronics is a leader in securing the necessary connection technology called near field communication, or NFC in its phones. But the Korean consumer electronics giant has been slow to respond to mobile payments, especially in the United States
"The partnership with Visa is a step towards a global mobile payment platform," Won-Pyo Hong, head of Samsung solution center media, said in a statement released today.
NFC is already in credit cards and keychains, and more flowed in smartphones built by people like Samsung, HTC and BlackBerry. On the side merchant, NFC is being slowly sink into the point of sale terminals pharmacies, subway terminals, and even taxis in New York.
A major barrier to mobile payments, has been the lack of devices that use NFC. Franchise Apple iPhone, for example, yet avoids technology. But learning capabilities Visa preloaded into a popular device like Galaxy S smartphone following businesses contribute to widen the net for potential users.
Samsung is expected to unveil the Galaxy S4 in mid-March, although the company has not confirmed the launch dates.
There should be about 2 billion devices shipped with NFC by 2017, according to ABI Research.
In addition, Samsung also announced that Visa hardware vendor Roam mobile commerce would also join the partnership program Visa Ready and build equipment that works with mobile payment system Visa. Products that bear the Visa symbol Ready.
Under the partnership, Roam get applications programming interfaces and software development kits that connect its facilities to Visa payment gateway, allowing merchants large and small to easily process transactions.
Mobile payments should be an important topic at the conference this year Mobile World Congress. MasterCard announced earlier its digital payment service MasterPass.
