Robert McKinley, Senior Analyst/Editor Robert McKinley, with 33 years experience covering payment cards and payment systems, is Senior Analyst/Editor for CardFlash and other payments-related publications. He is the retired founder and chief executive of RAM Research, CardWeb and CardTrak. McKinley served as an expert witness in 100+ litigations including two multi-$billion trials, testified before the U.S. Congress, chaired multiple payments conferences, hired as consultant by Fortune 100 companies and several overseas financial institutions. Full Bio: www.rbm4.com

Wirecard extends BLE development to vouchers and loyalty points

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At this year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Wirecard AG will be presenting the expansion of its Bluetooth low energy payment technology to include integrated vouchers and loyalty schemes. Bluetooth low energy (BLE) radio technology facilitates contactless data transfer at a distance of up to 10 metres. Using micro transmitters (“beacons”), BLE provides location-based services that are communicated to the point of sale for mobile marketing activities. As soon as a customer comes within the range of the beacons, retailers can take advantage of an additional communication channel and send personalised offers to the customer’s mobile device. These include discounts, special offers and loyalty schemes that are directly related to the customer’s current location within the store. BLE has already been integrated into a number of Apple, Google and Windows smartphone operating systems.

OKI Delivers First ATM Incorporating Finger Vein Authentication to Chinese Bank

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OKI announced the delivery and start of actual use of an ATM incorporating finger vein authentication technology at the Bank of Lanzhou in China (headquarters in Lanzhou city, Gansu province). This marks OKI’s first delivery of an ATM incorporating finger vein biometric authentication technology to a Chinese bank. OKI aims for expanded sales of ATMs incorporating finger vein authentication, a feature that makes forgery and identity fraud significantly more difficult. This function is especially important in the Chinese ATM market, where demand is growing for transaction safety and security. Based on OKI’s ATM-Recycler G7, cash-recycling ATM, the ATM incorporating finger vein authentication functionality delivered to the Bank of Lanzhou incorporates the finger vein authentication module co-developed by mofiria Corporation (hereinafter called as mofiria) and OKI.

U.S. CREDIT CARD VOLUME 2013

1, Country, Priority, UNITED STATESLeave a comment

U.S. bank credit card networks racked up $2.47 trillion in gross dollar volume (GDV) last year, an 7.7% gain over the prior year. This is the third consecutive annual decline in growth rates for U.S. credit card GDV, after gaining nearly 15% in 2011 and slightly more than 11% in 2012. Over the past five years, Visa, MasterCard, and Discover have lost market share based on credit card GDV, During this period American Express claimed a sizable gain, rising from a 19.0% market share in 2009 to 25.8% market share for 2013, largely fueled by charge cards.

Visa payWave accounts in Virtual Cloud

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Visa today announced it is offering clients new options to securely deploy mobile payment programs, including for the first time an option to host Visa payWave-enabled accounts in a secure, virtual cloud. The move expands Visa’s support for mobile payments globally and will give financial institutions greater choice in offering consumers secure ways to pay with smartphones. Visa’s support for cloud-based payments follows the introduction of a new feature in the Android mobile operating system called Host Card Emulation (HCE); HCE allows any NFC application on an Android device to emulate a smart card, letting users wave-to-pay with their smartphones, while permitting financial institutions to host payment accounts in a secure, virtual cloud.

Capital One Joins clearXchange Network

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Capital One Financial Corporation and clearXchange announced that Capital One, N. A. has joined the clearXchange network as an owner, becoming the fourth owner alongside Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, and Wells Fargo and fifth bank customer of the clearXchange network. clearXchange is the first network in the U.S. created by and for financial institutions that lets customers send person-to-person payments easily and securely with only an email address or phone number. As a member of the network, Capital One will expand its capabilities to provide customers the ability to pay anyone with a U.S. bank account without requiring sensitive account information.

MasterCard to Use HCE for NFC Payment Transactions

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MasterCard today announced it will publish a specification that leverages Host Card Emulation (HCE) for secure near field communication (NFC) payment transactions. The approach will enable consumers to easily use their MasterCard-branded cards on their NFC-enabled phones to make contactless payments. Today, there are two million contactless-enabled merchant locations in 63 countries around the world.

AnywhereCommerce adds three payments execs to team

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AnywhereCommerce added three recognized payments executives to bolster its international business activities. William Nichols, Nigel Bidmead, and Jimmy Quake have joined the company to drive sales initiatives and develop business across its growing global footprint. AnywhereCommerce has an established market presence in the North America, LAC, EMEA and APAC with its award-winning aCommerce series of mobile point of sale (mPOS) solutions. Driving international sales and marketing with a current focus on Latin American and the Caribbean is William Nichols, who was named executive vice president of international markets. Prior to joining AnywhereCommerce, Nichols held executive positions at First Data Corporation and VeriFone, where he was responsible for channel development and expansion, sales execution, product strategy development, and consulting services. Nigel Bidmead, who was named executive vice president, is responsible for business development and sales activities in the EMEA region. Bidmead comes to the company after several senior executive roles with industry giants First Data, VeriFone and ACI where he led large teams of personnel and drove important deals in the areas of electronic payments, cards, authorization and settlement systems, as well as software and telecommunications.Rounding out the expanded international management team is Jimmy Quake who has some 20 years of experience in the payments sector, and will serve as AnywhereCommerce’s senior vice president for the Asia-Pacific region, and will lead business development and market expansion efforts in that locale. Before joining AnywhereCommerce, Quake served as vice president for ViVoTech, and held a number of executive positions for VeriFone in Australia and Asia.

Montise Performs to Keep in the Black

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Montise posted H1 FY 2014 revenue £46.5m, up 67% on H1 FY 2013. Gross margin increased to 73% from 72% in H1 FY 2013, with user generated margin particularly strong, owing to a number of product licence deals following recent customer wins and renewals. Adjusted loss after tax (2)of £16.4m (H1 FY 2013 loss: £21.0m) and adjusted loss per share of 1.0p (H1 FY 2013 loss: 1.8p). Statutory loss after tax of £22.0m (H1 FY 2013 loss: £30.3m) with loss per share of 1.4p (H1 FY 2013 loss: 2.6p).

Amazon Coins-Spend and Earn On Android Devices

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Amazon this morning announced that customers in the US, UK and Germany can now buy, spend and earn Amazon Coins on their Android phones and tablets. Previously available for use exclusively on Kindle Fire tablets, Amazon Coins can now be used to buy the latest apps, like Ridiculous Fishing, purchase extra lives within Candy Crush, or unlock Red’s amazing Super Roaster in Angry Birds GO directly from their Android device. Customers simply need to download the latest version of the Amazon Appstore and their existing Coins balances automatically appear. Existing Android customers can upgrade to the latest version of the Amazon Appstore on their mobile device by visiting www.amazon.com/updateappstore and new customers can download the Amazon Appstore on their mobile device by visiting www.amazon.com/getappstore.

Meritus Payment Solutions Names New CTO

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Mark Adams has joined Meritus Payment Solutions as Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer. Mr. Adams brings extensive expertise in product development, application engineering, and the building of highly scalable cloud based infrastructures. In his role at Meritus, he will oversee product engineering, application development, IT infrastructure, and information security. A proven leader with 19 years of technology experience, Mr. Adams comes to Meritus from HireRight where he served as CIO and VP of Engineering. Before joining HireRight, Mr. Adams led the development of financial and contact center applications for Auto Club of Southern California. His prior experience also includes serving as Vice President of Information Technology for Lending Tree Loans where he focused on the delivery of highly scalable mortgage processing infrastructure and applications.

MASTERCARD MEA 2013

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The Middle East and Africa segment of MasterCard’s Asia-Pacific-Middle East-Africa region (APMEA) exploded in 2013 with a number of new cards entering the market, proliferation of mobile payments and Shari’a compliant MasterCards. At the end of the third quarter there were 410 million cards issued in the APMEA region. Gross dollar volume for the third quarter was $410 billion. MasterCard will release fourth quarter and annual results on January 31 before the market opens.

Datacard Announces EMV Services Unit

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Datacard Group secure ID and card personalization solutions announced it will be providing financial institutions, retailers and service bureaus with guidance and best practices to help simplify the transition to the industry-wide EMV smart card standards, including the 2015 liability shift in the U.S. The new EMV Professional Service offerings – provided by Datacard Group – give organizations a wide-range of educational material, technology tools and resources designed to help them make calculated decisions on what they need for EMV smart card programs.
Assessment & Planning Services – including existing infrastructure analysis, card type selection and management, authentication and authorization requirements, customer service and expert-by-your side consulting to help ease the transition to EMV smart card programs. Implementation Services – this includes project planning, scripting services, data preparation, chip personalization, key management, and central or instant issuance.