News

April, 2006

• 12 April

  ViVOtech Boss Predicts NFC Will Soon Enable Payments for E-Retailers

  The chief executive of the company holding the largest market share of installed readers for contactless payments predicts the technology, assisted by near-field communication (NFC) capability, will move rapidly from the physical point of sale to e-commerce. Mohammad Khan, president and founder of ViVOtech Inc., which makes electronic wallets for …
• 11 April

  NACHA’s Web Payment Pilot to Start by Early ’07, Run 12 Months

  NACHA's long-expected pilot project to test Internet payments to retailers and billers will get under way early next year and will run for 12 months, the Herndon, Va.-based organization said Monday. In a conference call it held to explain the new automated clearing house payment application and discuss the rationale …
• 10 April

  VeriFone Gains Wireless-Terminal Strength with Lipman Acquisition

  VeriFone Holdings Inc.'s proposed $793 million acquisition of rival Lipman Electronics Engineering Ltd. will give the U.S.'s leading payment terminal maker access to more countries and the fast-growing wireless-terminal segment, a processing analyst tells Digital Transactions News. “The advantage for VeriFone is to get into more countries offshore,” says Jamie …
• 10 April

  Debitman’s New CEO Stresses More Merchants, Issuers, And Products

  Debitman Card Inc.'s new chief executive sees no significant strategic changes ahead for the PIN debit network, though he says some new products are likely within a year, possibly including a stored-value offering. “I think the strategy is spot-on,” says Michael Grossman, a former Intuit Inc. executive and most recently …
• 7 April

  FastLane Launches Its POS Advertising Program with a $2 Million Deal

  Boulder, Colo.-based Combined Payments Inc.'s FastLane, a new network that converts driver's licenses into loyalty and payment cards, Thursday announced that it had secured its first advertiser as part of a point-of-sale program that will share revenues with participating merchants. The $2 million deal involves the La Jolla, Calif., office …
• 6 April

  PayPal Mobile Launches with Five Merchants, More in ‘Pipleline’

  PayPal Inc. today officially joined the race for mobile-phone transactions, announcing the commercial availability of its much-anticipated PayPal Mobile service. The product, word of which leaked two weeks ago while the San Jose, Calif.-based processor was testing it with its own employees and those of parent company eBay Inc., comes …
• 6 April

  Looking to Mass NFC Usage, MasterCard Tries Over-the-Air Downloads

  Seeking to remove a roadblock standing in the way to eventual mass consumer usage of mobile phones equipped with a form of contactless technology called near-field communication (NFC), MasterCard International this week unveiled a service that will allow cell-phone users to download their account data and other critical information to …
• 5 April

  New Merchants Will Fuel Contactless Growth, But Trouble Lurks

  Shipments of contactless-payment transponders–the cards, keyfobs, and other devices consumers use to make radio-wave payments at the point of sale?will explode in 2006, reaching 45 million units, up from 13 million last year, according to ABI Research, an Oyster Bay, N.Y., research firm that follows radio-frequency-identification technology markets. Most of …
• 5 April

  SVPCO Swaps More Images in First Quarter Than in All of 2005

  The country's largest image-exchange network reported today it handled more volume in the year's first quarter than it processed in all of 2005, while traffic reached new heights in March. Average daily volume at SVPCO's Image Payments Network, which links a dozen banks as well as the Federal Reserve for …
• 4 April

  Citigroup Will Brand 5,500 7-Eleven ATMs in Surcharge-Free Deal

  In a move that quintuples the number of ATMs in its network, Citigroup Inc. today announced it will brand machines in 5,500 7-Eleven Inc. convenience stores in 31 states. The ATMs, which will bear the Citibank brand, will allow customers to withdraw cash without incurring surcharges, a feature the bank …