Mobile payments

The Washington, D.C. Metro transportation system says it will test new electronic fare equipment after completing a deal with Accenture to replace older systems.

Petrosoft, a business software provider, is offering quick service retailers and their customers new products to streamline the point of sale experience.

Telefonica O2 UK Ltd. is shutting down the Near Field Communication-based mobile wallet it launched for consumers in the U.K. nearly three years ago.

PulseWallet, a biometrics payments provider, is again touting its payment and authentication device, but it must overcome a sudden emergence of competitors that is also trying to breathe life into an idea that has had spotty success in the market.

Stripe is the latest payments provider to integrate its technology with Ecwid, a developer of e-commerce tools to add turnkey online stores to websites, blogs and social media pages.

SCVNGR's LevelUp expected merchants would prefer its Interchange Zero pricing for mobile payments, but many clients told the company they would prefer to pay a 2% transaction fee.

OnPoint Community Credit Union is using person-to-person payments as the foundation of building consumer comfort with mobile as a channel for money movement.

Of all the potential benefits, mobile-driven loyalty is the factor with the greatest potential to drive consumer adoption of mobile payments.

Mercury Payment Systems LLC plans to upgrade its closed-loop gift card system so that any small to mid-size merchant can offer gift, loyalty and reloadable prepaid options to customers in one card.

Seamless has signed an agreement with Visita, a Swedish hospitality industry and employers organization, to use the SEQR mobile payment system.

Mobile technology vendor 1OAK says it can enable any point of sale machine to accept payments from a smartphone without changes to infrastructure or back-end payment processing systems.

The new Square iPhone case, designed with accessory developer Griffin Technology, kicks off a program that encourages the development of accessories for Square payments hardware.

Total Merchant Services says it will expand its tablet-based point of sale and cloud-based offerings after acquiring Registroid LLC and its products.

Mobile payments company I Love Velvet plans to win the business of international merchants by combining its mobile point of sale offering with broader e-commerce and security compliance tools.

One of the newest location-based payment apps came out of Brett Neese's house on a Friday night.

Cloud-based wallets, QR code wallets and other software-based wallets seem to be shoving Near Field Communication hardware out of the spotlight. But reports of the death of NFC, which enables contactless payments from many mobile devices, have been greatly exaggerated.

E-commerce technology provider Shopify has launched a redesigned version of its iOS mobile app, adding features designed to enable store management and mobile payments.

While most gift cards are still made of plastic, digital cards are increasing in popularity among consumers because of the many options to customize the cards.

Google will discontinue Bump and Flock, two file-sharing apps Google acquired when it purchased Bump Technologies last year.

As more payments companies seek the next big thing, they are finding that mobile payments tech is due for a makeover, and a lot more attention surrounds digital currency such as Bitcoin.