Snippet: Contact Less ☇

Horace Dediu:

When applying this dichotomy to competition, we need to be careful about who we define as competitors. Note that I said that Apple Pay is in a fight with non-consumption. It’s tempting to say Apple Pay competes with some other payment system like Samsung Pay or Google Pay. But none of these alternatives are as powerful as the existing mix of contact payment systems: cash, credit card magnetic swiping and some other hybrid of codes and user experiences (especially online.)

I’ve had a few friends joke about how many ____ Pay services are out there now. While it may be a bit silly that Apple, Google, and then many Android phone manufacturers are introducing their own payment systems, all have one thing in common—NFC. If one works, generally, they all work. Because of this, it’s more about getting a merchant to accept any of these than for Apple to win and Google to lose.

Apple Pay also has the web/in-app component, which is in the works for Android Pay, but I’ve enjoyed this more in that I’m not entering my details multiple times (shipping & billing) or storing my actual card data with a particular merchant or service. That may be the big win for Apple Pay in the long run.