Digital Transactions Authoritative, insightful and timely information for payments professionals
The cashless vending machine payment market is about to get more competitive. Apriva Inc., a specialist in wireless payment technology, this week introduced its Apriva Vend system. With it, Scottsdale, Ariz.-based Apriva is throwing its hat into a ring dominated by USA Technologies Inc., which says it welcomes the new …
Read More »Just Days After Its Debut, Square Changes Its Processing Fees
Square Inc., the new payment system from Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey, has adjusted its merchant pricing less than three weeks after its debut. Merchants will pay more on card-present transactions under $100 and less on bigger sales compared with the original plan. Card-not-present transactions, however, will cost more until a …
Read More »Mercury Payment Sells Stake As M&A Reps Prowl the ETA Show
The growing interest of private-equity firms in merchant processors showed itself again Wednesday when the big independent sales organization Mercury Payment Systems Inc. disclosed that Silver Lake would take a 60% interest in the company. Meanwhile, private-equity executives were out in force at the Electronic Transactions Association annual meeting in …
Read More »MasterCard Gets a New Boss, Signs E-Commerce Pact
MasterCard Inc. announced a notable pact with a technology company Friday that the No. 2 payment card network says would drive e-commerce transaction volume. That news, however, was overshadowed Monday morning when MasterCard announced that Ajay Banga, the company's president and chief operating officer, would replace long-time chief executive Robert …
Read More »As 2-D Barcodes Gain Steam for M-Payments, a Novel Twist Emerges
The use of two-dimensional bar-code technology for mobile payments appears to be picking up momentum. On the heels of a major expansion of the technology, announced last week by Starbucks Coffee Co. and Target Corp., a startup company this week announced it is launching a so-called private beta for a …
Read More »A Dutch Gateway Touts Pricing, Overseas Reach in U.S. Launch
Pressure from the down economy is pushing more online merchants to seek out ways of selling to overseas customers, creating an opportunity for startups like Adyen Inc., a Netherlands-based online payments gateway that announced this week it has started operations in the U.S. Gateways funnel payments for online merchants to …
Read More »Eye on Mobile: An Apple-ViVOtech Rumor; Google Invests in a Gateway
In an example of how fast news can spread in the over heated atmosphere of mobile payments, news items and blog postings appeared on Monday and Tuesday suggesting that Apple Inc. is angling to buy Vivotech Inc., a vendor of hardware and software for contactless payments. At the same time, …
Read More »DataTreasury’s Trial Victory Doesn’t Bring Legal Marathon to an End
The jury verdict rendered Friday in favor of a small software company that says big banks and processors are trampling on its electronic-check patents may have boosted that company's cause but it hardly brings down the curtain on what has been a costly legal marathon for the payments industry. “We're …
Read More »All-Digital Checks Get a Boost from an ‘Outsider’ Technology Startup
The concept of an all-digital check, which surfaced in a paper published in November by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, could move from theory to reality in a matter of months now that a technology startup in Atlanta has won a pair of patents covering applications of the idea. …
Read More »Bill-to-Carrier Rivalry Heats up with Danal’s Verizon Breakthrough
Competition in the bill-to-carrier mobile payments market is heating up with Verizon Wireless's announcement it will offer the service directly to consumers through Danal Inc.'s BilltoMobile payment service within the next few weeks. The deal marks Seoul, Korea-based mobile payments operator Danal's first contract in the U.S. Danal is in …
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