Alternative acquirers

Square Inc. spent six weeks in Portland, Ore. — a city with a strong existing base of micro-merchants — to transform it into one of the company's top U.S. markets in total Apple Pay transactions conducted with its card readers.

Caffe Ladro's had an online store for years, but it's never been as important as it is today, as the Seattle chain faces competitors — including the notoriously tech-savvy Starbucks — that have stretched the limits of how to sell coffee online and through mobile devices.

Square Inc. may be having a tougher time convincing merchants to buy its $49 EMV card reader than it did the free magstripe version it built its business on.

Square's practice of using its merchant transaction data for risk analysis may seem innovative, but other other agile specialists—including Intuit—are finding ways to use new data streams to limit risk and deliver funds to borrowers.

Square Inc. shares fell as much as 20 percent on concerns about financing for its small-business customer-loan program, a service that had been viewed as a growth area for the digital-payments company.

Square Inc. reported first-quarter revenue that topped analysts’ estimates, suggesting the digital-payments business can keep growing amid increasing competition from PayPal Holdings Inc. and Apple Inc.

Five years ago, Dwolla took its ambitious approach to speeding up payments to financial institutions, viewing banks as a core audience in need of modernizing its aging infrastructure. But more recently, the company had to make a sharp course correction in its strategy.

Eager to appease EMV-weary stores, Sionic Mobile is finishing tests on a system that uses a three-digit code to execute payments via mobile devices.

The world of payments is changing, and a lot of that change results from the dedication of innovative retailers. Whether partnering with payment companies or going it alone, these brands are putting fresh ideas into practice.

PayPal Holdings Inc. reported first-quarter sales and profit that beat estimates, adding customers against an onslaught of competition from credit-card issuers, startups and smartphone makers looking for a piece of the fast-growing digital payments market.