Walmart still doesn’t accept Apple Pay, but that doesn’t mean they don’t see a bright future for mobile payments.
At a recent investor conference, Walmart CFO Charles Holley emphasized the important of mobile payments for Walmart and hinted at plans to offer more mobile payment solutions in the future.
“You see with … mobile payments, I think that’s definitely where the future is going to be going for our customers,” said Holley, adding that the company has a “billion dollar investment” in its online and mobile infrastructure to improve both platforms for consumers.
Walmart made headlines a few months ago when they decided not to be a part of the Apple Pay rollout, and many argued that the company would never accept Apple Pay, instead favoring their own proprietary payment platform, known as CurrentC.
It was a surprise, then, when Holley suggested that Apple Pay could become a partner with Walmart at some point.
“How that all plays out, I don’t think anybody knows yet, but we do know that is going to go in the mobile and whether it’s going to be an Apple Pay or a CurrentC which is a consortium of retailers or something that the Android devices do, it’s going to be some combination of that,” he said.
With mCommerce still doubling in size according to some reports, big box retailers cannot afford to wait on mPayment solutions.
At the same time, those who are hungry to keep as much technology in-house in an effort to hoard data may find their customers going elsewhere as mPayments become less of a treat and more of a default.
With that in mind, Walmart’s support of Apple Pay—as well as Google and Samsung’s latest offerings—may come sooner rather than later.