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MagicCube Inc. has chiefly aimed its tap-to-pay technology at small sellers to allow them to take card payments directly on an off-the-shelf mobile device. But on Monday the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company announced a version of its i-Accept platform for enterprise and big-box merchants.
To make i-Accept more attractive to large merchants and help them improve checkout, MagicCube has added several new features to the platform. These include: multi-acquirer and multi-merchant support from a single platform; direct integration into complex systems without affecting scope or certification with respect to the PCI data-security standard; unchanged transaction routing with full control of the existing acquirer and merchant flows; flexible management of acceptance rules across multiple geographies, message translation across different standards; and support of current and future compliance requirements for large retailers.
The move also gives MagicCube a competitive boost against rival Apple Inc.’s Tap to Pay technology, which enables iPhone users to accept cards without requiring a connected device. The computing giant scored a big gain last week for its Tap to Pay for iPhone technology when Block Inc.’s Square acquiring unit said it would adopt the technology for its merchants. Apple established a foothold in Tap To Pay technology when it acquired Mobeewave Inc. in 2020.
“With Apple releasing Tap to Pay as a component of its proprietary iOS operating system, it becomes more urgent to serve the 2 billion Android users that represent more than 70% of the global mobile market,” MagicCube chief executive and co-founder Sam Shawki says in a prepared statement. “i-Accept brings a robust, enterprise-grade solution that is secure and not tied to a specific device maker, operating system, or card network—making it ideal to go beyond small and micro merchants and serve large retailers, which have a vast array of use cases.”
MagicCube says i-Accept allows acquiring banks and other financial-services institutions to enable large merchants to accept contactless transactions via payment cards and mobile wallets such as Apple Pay, Google Pay, and Samsung Pay at card-present rates and without limits on transaction amounts for consumers. The technology can also support local card schemes or crypto wallets, as well as checkout features such as buy now, pay later, and rewards programs.
The platform can also capture PINs and other verification methods on NFC-enabled smart devices, which MagicCube says is a key feature in markets where the use of PINs is required for payment transactions, such as Europe.
