A new player is in the mobile wallet game. Samsung Pay is now available on the Galaxy S6 and S6 Edge. Samsung Pay is the newest competitor for Apple Pay Inc. Apple Pay exclusively uses NFC to make mobile payments, the new Samsung Pay use LoopPay. LoopPay is a magnetic-stripe radio field technology that is set to rival Apple Pay’s NFC tech this summer. Samsung reps are hopeful that the mobile wallet will be embraced and understood by consumers.
When a registered user accesses LoopPay, they need only to press the button on a LoopPay fob or navigate to the app on their smartphone. The user then selects the payment card and presses the “Tap to Pay” button. The data is then transferred to the point-of-sale reader via a magnetic field that any POS terminal can translate, as the signal mimics the same magnetic field change that is passed through a reader with a traditional mag-stripe card.
Samsung’s LoopPay technology is exciting to many in the industry, as it could mean an increase in customer use of Samsung Pay. Right now, Apple Pay solely runs off of NFC technology which must be matched with NFC terminals. There are only 220,000 of these terminals in the United States. But Samsung Pay uses the same magnetic technology found on regular debit and credit cards. As a result, Samsung Pay users can use the mobile wallet on any of the 8 million POS terminals already in existence.
Even though Samsung Pay seems like it may be the next step in mobile wallet evolution, some critics believe it is just a temporary solution, and see NFC as the future. Others lack confidence in Samsung’s ability to manage a payments ecosystem. Regardless of criticism, most in the industry believe that the entry of Samsung Pay is a good thing for merchants for now.
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