POS and Retail

Following the path paved by the checkout-free Amazon Go concept, the newly merged Albertsons and Rite Aid are developing their own technologies for faster and more efficient checkouts.

Innovations such as automated smart safes can make it easier to track the flow of paper money, reducing theft risk, and cut down on the number of armored truck pickups, according to Sam Bosch, president and CEO of Peregrin Financial Technologies.

Incumbent bank wires and checks, for example, carry slow settlement times and poor exchanges rates, while some newer fintech alternatives lack the interoperability with one another to scale and sometimes prioritize speed over security, writes Peter Shore, general manager of Transpay

The departure is likely to fuel speculation of a presidential run.

The City of London, in collaboration with iZettle, is introducing the world’s first contactless card payment scheme for street performers. And as PayPal completes its purchase of iZettle, it's likely that this technology will spread to the U.S.

For some, the fast pace of change in payments technology needs to slow down for consumers and merchants to catch up. For others, the technology must evolve because it is the consumer and merchant seeking change — all in the name of an easier, mobile experience.

Supermarkets and other retailers reported rejected transactions after a network glitch, causing some to quickly deploy cash-only checkouts.

Many of these attacks have been server side ransomware and other sophisticated hacks, leading companies to examine the immature security processes, the technology of application security, and the insufficient expertise of development, writes Jeannie Warner, the security manager at WhiteHat Security.

Retailers often try to counter Amazon's dominance by using the e-commerce giant's strengths against it, including its reliance on search engine optimization.

Virtual reality is seeing significant leaps in technology, with immediate applications to gaming and entertainment that foreshadow richer applications for VR in commerce.

Unless near zero-friction identity security is embraced, connected devices cannot be used for payments in a substantial way, according to Xavier Larduinat, manager for innovation at Gemalto.

We need to rethink how we acquire and manage consumer data, and any business using enterprise software needs to be accountable for how information is being processed, transported or shared, writes Chris Wong, CEO of LifeSite.

The companies have built a product that attempts to beat the current standard of next or same day settlement.

It's vital to be in touch with consumer shopping and payment tastes for individual retail categories and consumer groups. That may or may not include removing cash and human interaction, according to Andrew Wind, principal product manager at Worldpay.

Square's taking on hundreds of millions of added debt to battle PayPal, indicating that the simple business model of turning a smartphone into a point of sale terminal is largely a thing of the past.

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. is leading the purchase of 10 percent of Chinese delivery service ZTO Express (Cayman) Inc. for $1.38 billion, a deal that’ll augment the e-commerce giant’s ability to ship packages around the globe.

Mobile technology can infer a user’s identity and make device-based decisions on the validity of a transaction, writes Kayne McGladrey, an IEEE member and director of information security services for Integral Partners.

Phishing is the likely culprit behind the recent Saks and Lord & Taylor breaches. Stronger email protection required to combat the threat, according to Matthew Vernhout, 250ok's director of privacy.

It’s not just weaker underwriting and higher household debt levels that are driving past-due rates to their highest levels in seven years.

Small and midsize businesses (SMBs) are adapting to digital payments technology at slower speeds and for different reasons than larger enterprises. Cash and checks still account for almost half of all SMB payments, and SMBs have lagged behind other merchants in the U.S. shift to EMV technology.