Alipay is in negotiations to take a 25% stake in German payments technology provider Wirecard, according to German newspaper Bild... More
Europe
Euro 2016 fans to get NFC wristbands for transport in Lille
PARTNER NEWS: Football fans at Euro 2016 will be able to pay for their journeys on the Transpole transport network in the French city of Lille with a tap of their wrist using an NFC transport ticketing wristband being rolled out by digital security giant Gemalto and public transit operator Keolis Lille... More
Ant Financial takes Alipay to Germany with Concardis
Chinese tourists will soon be able to make payments at 210,000 store locations in Germany serviced by payment provider Concardis using Ant Financial’s Alipay mobile payment platform. The move marks the service’s launch into Europe after the company unveiled its expansion plans at Money20/20 Europe in April 2016. More
European Commission approves Visa’s acquisition of Visa Europe
The European Commission has approved the proposed acquisition of Visa Europe by Visa... More
Samsung Pay makes European debut in Spain
Samsung Pay has begun rolling out across Spain, making it the first European market where the mobile payment service is available. The service has launched with support from CaixaBank and ImaginBank and will also be available for customers of Abanca and Banco Sabadell “soon”. More
Mobile ticketing market to see major growth
The global mobile ticketing market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of around 16% between 2016 and 2020, according to Technavio... More
Visa Europe records contactless growth across the continent
Some 3bn contactless transactions were made across Europe on Visa cards and payment-enabled devices in the year to 30 April 2016, growing from 143m transactions a month in April 2015 to 360m in April 2016... More
Apple Pay to expand rapidly in Asia and Europe
Apple is “working rapidly” to expand Apple Pay across more countries in Asia and Europe, Jennifer Bailey, VP of the mobile payment service, has told TechCrunch... More
Visa Europe to make it easier for banks to support third-party mobile wallets
Visa Europe has launched its Visa Europe Digital Enablement Programme (VEDEP) in the UK in an effort to simplify the implementation process for banks looking to support third-party mobile wallets... More
Europeans make 3bn Visa contactless payments in past 12 months
Some 3bn contactless transactions have been made across Europe using Visa cards in the past 12 months, nearly tripling the number made in the previous 12-month period, Visa Europe has revealed. More
Gemalto and Visa roll out contactless payment wristbands at Eurovision
PARTNER NEWS: Visitors to the 2016 Eurovision Song Contest (ESC) in Stockholm, Sweden, this month will be able to purchase contactless payment wristbands that will enable payments at any Visa contactless terminal in the world. The wristbands, which will be active until the end of October, will be rolled out by Visa and digital security giant Gemalto. More
Paytec to enable mobile payments using colour-coded light signals
Italian payments solutions provider Payment Technologies (Paytec) is to build a new mobile payment technology into its vending machines that will let consumers make contactless payments using colour-coded light signals and tokenisation. More
A third of Europeans have made a mobile payment
Nearly a third of European consumers (32%) have now made an in-store mobile payment, research by Fujitsu shows, while 22% have adopted wearable technologies... More
PayPal CEO announces NFC payments expansion
Vodafone Wallet with PayPal NFC-enabled payments is now live in Spain and is expected to be made available across Europe throughout the “back half of 2016”, PayPal CEO Dan Schulman revealed during the company’s Q1 earnings call. More
More than half of payment cards shipped in 2015 were contactless
Contactless technology was built into 56% of all smart cards shipped globally excluding the Americas in 2015, up from 42% in 2014, the Smart Payment Association reports... More
NFC SIM shipment remains static in 2015 due to Softcard closure
The global number of NFC SIM card shipments remained static during 2015 following the closure of the Softcard mobile wallet in the US last year, the SIMalliance has revealed, despite reporting significant NFC SIM growth across Asia and Europe. More