Mobile point-of-sale

PayPal must pay a fine to the U.K.’s top financial watchdog for failing to keep its operations completely separate from iZettle while authorities investigated competitive effects of PayPal's purchase of the Sweden-based mobile POS provider.

The major technology companies that have chipped away at incumbent payment businesses face much larger competition from this year’s big processing mergers, but they’ve also bulked up through fundraising and product development.

Emphasizing its expansion into multi-channel payments, Credorax is partnering with mobile point of sale developer BBPOS to provide mobile POS solutions for independent software vendors and sales organizations across Europe.

To eke out growth in the mature payments terminal market, Square is taking its newest NFC-enabled hardware to markets outside the U.S. with heavy contactless card penetration, where some merchants are likely to be behind the technology curve.

SumUp, a U.K.-based mobile point of sale company, needed a way to differentiate itself from larger rivals such as PayPal, Square and iZettle. Its solution is to offer faster settlement, in partnership with Starling Bank.

The large payment processor mergers were meant to give bigger companies a better way to compete against the nimble startups that were luring their customers away for digital services such as mobile point of sale. And post-merger, Fiserv and First Data have fired their first salvo.

There's been a significant lag in how financial institutions serve commercial clients with mobile technology, and that creates an opportunity for credit unions.

Square's working to boost its appeal to third-party developers, especially as a growing number of competitors and broader economic challenges loom on the horizon.

Square has launched Square Terminal in Canada in an effort to lure merchants that use myriad iPads, tablets and smartphones to receive payments in stores and remotely.

In a bid to help small businesses whose transaction volumes don’t warrant acquiring a dedicated POS terminal, National Australia Bank is partnering with Visa and Quest Payment Systems to pilot a tap-on-phone solution that provides secure contactless card acceptance using the business owner’s smartphone.

Square has worked hard in the past several years to offer more than just mobile card acceptance, but not all of its efforts have paid off.

Square Inc. is selling its Caviar food-delivery app to DoorDash Inc. for $410 million, as the money-losing payments company searches for profits.

As checkout-free stores dramatically reduce — or even eliminate — the need for point-of-sale devices, terminal makers are turning their focus to multichannel services that can keep younger, digital-savvy customers coming into stores.

The mobile point of sale market has grown far beyond its roots as an off-the-shelf dongle for smartphones. The category is now driving major acquisitions, collaborations and international deployments.

ING is piloting an Android-based app that supports smartphone card payments without a connected dongle or investment in a payment terminal.

Security platform provider MagicCube is partnering with IT services company NTT Data to certify and deploy software that allows the secure input of sensitive data on a touch screen.

Shift4 Payments is giving away free payment terminals to restaurants again, but this time it's using a cloud-based approach with richer marketing tools, including links to social media.

The fintech M&A wave is sweeping over the dining and fast-food industries, with major companies like Amazon, Walmart and American Express spending on smaller firms that focus on digital food delivery and payments.

Small business owners using Square's payments platform and business tools may soon be asking "Elle" for assistance with customers.

In the wake of Zelle, Venmo and Apple Cash getting more active users and potential revenue, Square is relying on its Square Cash App and Cash Card as key drivers for its own growth.