Mobile payments

Apple is launching its mobile in the U.S. only, but Visa Europe is working closely with its member banks and the tech giant to bring Apple Pay to Europe as well, and there are signs that Apple has its sights on other markets.

U.S. merchants will have to upgrade their terminals soon to be able to support the influx of Apple devotees who will want to use their new phones to make payments.

Chase Paymentech has opened three developer labs in the U.S. to accelerate Apple Pay adoption in mobile commerce.

Subway's substantial support of the telco-led Softcard mobile wallet and the recently unveiled Apple Pay, which both use Near Field Communication for payments, is a sign that the technology's interoperability is paying off in larger deployments.

Apriva has added data analytics and business management tools to its payments software for bank and merchant services clients, along with a Web portal where merchants can review consumer behavior.

The U.K. telco-backed mobile commerce venture Weve is reportedly ending its plans for a universal mobile wallet. Its members will work on their own individual mobile wallets, which will be challenged when they face off against the upcoming Apple Pay.

E-commerce payments provider Adyen has partnered with Evernote, which offers software for note-taking and archiving, to launch Alipay's mobile-optimized checkout for users in China.

VeriFone and Creative Mobile Technologies are collaborating to remove a major barrier for the taxi rider who wants to use a smartphone to pay, but has the wrong app.

Square has raised $100 million in funding at a valuation of about $6 billion, according to Fortune, which attributed the news to market data source VCExperts.com

Apple's long-anticipated move into mobile payments seemed to cover all the bases — Apple Pay will launch with the support of major banks, card networks and retailers. But there were several things that didn't make it into the first version of its mobile wallet.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will provide $100,000 to organizations that promote the use of digital payments for the poor.

Just two days after Apple unveiled its new program designed to speed the adoption and use of mobile payments, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau Director Richard Cordray cited the burgeoning field as a key area of concern.

"What you are seeing is a company like Apple, representing 40 percent of operating system penetration, helping introduce [tokenization] for us in a way that consumers will find comfortable and easy to adopt," said Matthew Dill, Visa's senior vice president and head of innovation and strategic partnerships.

TrialPay has launched a software development kit called Evergreen, with the goal of expanding the company's mobile business.

The vision that Apple’s founder Steve Jobs once had of a new type of mobile phone that could become so instrumental and integrated into people’s lives that they’d rather leave their wallet at home than their iPhone is starting to take shape.

MasterCard is establishing a foundation for mobile wallets in Europe by requiring the continent's merchants to accept contactless payments by the end of the decade.

If you can't beat them, join them — and join them fast. The other mobile wallets that already exist on Apple's ecosystem, such as LevelUp and Softcard (formerly Isis), are quickly working to integrate with Apple Pay and the iPhone 6 rather than try to defeat them.

Apple Pay appears to be missing one key thing: A reason to use it. Most other mobile wallets come with a reward program, but Apple currently isn't going that route.

Discover plans to join American Express, MasterCard and Visa in the Apple Pay service, enabling storage of Discover cards in Passbook.

Apple has a long list of supporters for its new mobile wallet, including a few key companies that had already thrown their hats in with PayPal and MCX. Retailers' support of Apple makes NFC a more likely prospect for PayPal mobile payments going forward.