To say that “mobile payments” is the pervasive buzz phrase du jour would be an understatement. The mobile payments ecosystem is getting increasingly complex and now includes even more players – issuers, card networks, mobile operators, online payments companies, Google, Apple, and now retailers, handset operators and emerging payments platforms like Square.
With the recent announcement of the Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX) and Apple’s Passbook, mobile wallets and mobile payments have clearly become a battleground that many of the constituents in the ecosystem are fighting to own. While it remains unclear who will win, how, and if these players can coalesce to a unified system, there are ample indicators that mobile payments are here to stay and that adoption is beginning.
