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| Apple will soon introduce contactless payments to iPhone |
Apple plans to launch a new service that will allow small businesses to accept payments directly from the iPhone without the need for additional hardware.
The company has been working on the new feature since around 2020, when it paid about $100 million to a Canadian startup called Mobeewave, which developed smartphone technology that accepts one-touch payments from credit cards.
The system will likely use the iPhone's built-in Near Field Communication chip or NFC, which is currently used in Apple Pay.
To accept iPhone payments today, merchants must use a payment terminal that connects to your phone or connects to your phone via Bluetooth.
The next feature turns the iPhone into a payment terminal instead. This allows users to accept payments by clicking a credit card or another iPhone on the back of their device.
It's unclear if the ability to accept payments can count as part of Apple Pay. The team that developed the feature has previously worked in the company's payments division since Mobeewave launched the feature.
It's also unclear if Apple intends to use this feature in partnership with existing payment networks or roll it out on its own.
The company will likely start rolling out the feature via a software update in the coming months. The company is expected to release the first beta of iOS 15.4 in the near future, which could lead to an end consumer release in the spring.
The first impression will be near some other ads. Bloomberg reports that Apple plans to launch a 5G-capable iPhone SE and iPad Air as early as March or April, along with a new Mac powered by the company's custom processor.
Apple wants to turn iPhone into a payment terminal
The company has expanded its payment options in recent years, introducing the Apple Card in the US in 2019. Later that year, it introduced an Apple Card installment plan for its devices.
It also offers the Apple Cash Card for peer-to-peer digital payments. It's working on a service for Apple Pay, which allows people to buy things and pay later in installments.
The iPhone won't be the first device to feature Mobeewave's payment acceptance technology. Samsung backed the startup before it was sold to Apple, allowing one-click credit card acceptance on its devices in 2019.
Mobeewave has already worked with Samsung. I tried a system called Samsung POS in Canada in 2019 before it was rolled out globally.
Samsung POS allows Samsung phones to accept payments directly from contactless cards and NFC payment services such as Apple Pay, Samsung Pay and Google Pay.