5 of Apple's Next Moves in Payments
September 9, 2016 12:42 PM
David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
Apple Pay may not have rendered plastic cards obsolete, but Apple remains invested in its plan for payments. Several of its recent hardware and software announcements provide a roadmap of the company's vision.
David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
iMessages
Apple CEO Tim Cook described a developing app store ecosystem for Apple's messaging system, with a brief nod to payment capabilities. This project will allow Apple to catch up to communication apps like Facebook Messenger and Snapchat that already support payments.
David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
Headphone Adapter
The removal of the headphone jack in Apple's latest iPhone is potentially disastrous to the mobile card-reader market that relies on the jack to transmit card data. But Apple isn't being totally dismissive of this audience; the included headphone-to-lightning port adapter should enable small merchants to accept cards on Apple's newest handsets.
David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
Apple Watch
Apple Pay got a nod in the features that Apple considers most vital to the Apple Watch, and it is continuing its support for payments in the next version of its smartwatch OS. This is in contrast to Google's Android Wear, which still does not require NFC in its smartwatches.
David Paul Morris/Bloomberg
Japan
Apple's announcement of FeliCa support in Japan indicates that it is willing to adapt to the payment standards of a region to build its customer base there. This seems to be a pivot from its original plan for Apple Pay, where it set the terms in a contract that banks decried as extremely one-sided.
Noah Berger/Bloomberg
Safari
Apple is taking baby steps in moving Apple Pay beyond the NFC and in-app ecosystem. Though it plans to support Apple Pay for Web-based transactions, it will limit this support to Safari , the default browser for Apple computers and mobile devices.
