The mobile payments frontier is looking pretty crowded these days, and the range of new entrants into the field isn’t likely to slow down any time soon. In fact, some new reports suggest that, starting soon, there will be one more entry, and a big one at that.
It’s Samsung Pay, and for the United States and South Korea, it’ll be one more tool in the toolbox.
The reports began when Samsung managing director Park Jin-Young revealed that Samsung Pay would be available in South Korea and the United States starting in the second half of 2015.
In a subsequent conference call following the company’s first quarter earnings report, Park noted that there was no timeline, as yet, to other countries beyond those two. In fact, such a timeline was still “under discussion.”
Samsung Pay is set to use magnetic secure transmission, which will actually represent something of a step up from Apple Pay, which instead focuses on near-field communications technology.
Using magnetic secure transmission essentially mimics the magnetic stripe technology used in current cards, meaning that any retailer that can already accept a credit or a debit card can take Samsung Pay. Those who accept NFC payments can also get in on the Samsung Pay action, which means rollout will be nearly immediate from the get-go.
Right now, the system will only be supported by the Galaxy S6 and the Galaxy S6 Edge, but reports suggest that support for the wearable devices in Samsung’s lineup will follow.
Samsung’s CEO, JK Shin, offered up a word of comment about the upcoming release, saying “Samsung Pay will reinvent how people pay for goods and services and transform how they use their smartphones. The secure and simple payment process, coupled with our robust partner network, makes Samsung Pay a truly game-changing service that will bring value to consumers and our partners in the ecosystem.”
It would be easy to dismiss Samsung Pay’s launch as too little too late, having to compete with an Apple Pay that will have been in the market nearly a year ahead of Samsung.
But Samsung has a particular edge over Apple Pay that’s worth noting; any merchant that can take Apple Pay can take Samsung Pay, and everywhere that Apple Pay isn’t accepted, Samsung Pay can be.
Samsung Pay appears to be usable everywhere a credit card is accepted, even with the upcoming EMV changes in the cards. That’s going to give it quite an advantage out of the gate; look how long it took Apple Pay to be accepted at some places. Worse, some places won’t take Apple Pay… like almost everyone in the Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX).
But Samsung Pay doesn’t appear to have that problem, giving it another clear edge. Launching in the second half of the year could be good, especially if it launches somewhere between August and October. It can launch close to the holiday shopping season—which for most starts in November—and really clean up in the interim.
In some ways, even though it’s not out yet, it’s well ahead of many of its competitors.