The launch of Powatag into 240 merchants including universal music and carrefour is a win for the mobile payments provider Powa. Powatag allows you to buy things anytime without entering in your address and credit card details all the time. It uses the phones’ mic and camera, to read print or television ads, as well as detecting a shoppers’ location in a store.
Yapital is the first payment system in Europe to integrate BLE technology into its service portfolio, allowing offline use. The company is taking very seriously the claim of offering a true ‘Everywhere Payment’ system that works in all situations. This means that users will be able to pay just as easily and intuitively with Yapital when they are in a dead spot as they can with perfect network coverage.The technology is simple; it has added bluetooth low energy to its POSCard, to work in settings without mobile network coverage, such as shops located underground.
Gilbarco is using Qualcomm’s Gimbal Bluetooth beacons to provide customized offers to motorists as they buy fuel. The idea is relatively straight forward: as a user approaches, the gas pump recognizes the users phone, if they had opted in.Payment options are offered on the consumers’ smartphone, where the transaction originates rather than at the pump. As the consumer pumps, targeted commercials play on the pump screen, with associated offers sent to the phone.
Mozido, a provider of white-label, mobile financial, commercial and marketing services, has begun piloting a person-to-person (P2P) proximity payment service using mobile phones.The company’s new P2P service is set to allow people within proximity of each other to exchange funds using their mobile phones. Using Bluetooth Low-Energy (BLE) technology, Mozido’s P2P proximity payment service is set to identify mobile users nearby who also use the service, allowing for enhanced financial transfers.
iMobile plans to support iBeacon in its Passmarket mobile loyalty program. When consumers visit a retailer using beacon, pass market would up on that and allow the customer to check out just by walking up to the point of sale.
Shopkick, a mobile rewards company that built its app on technology that uses a smartphone’s mic to pick up an ultrasonic signal, is vying for a piece of the very lucrative pie that is mobile loyalty schemes. The company began deploying ibeacons at Macy’s locations in New York and San Francisco last year.
Index, which provides technology that analyzes customer behavior, plans to support Bluetooth-based beacons to detect a customer’s presence and deliver personalized messages on an iPad or the consumes smartphone.