The Apple Beat: Why Apple Pay is sending shockwaves through the payments industry

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

 Apple Pay is actually a very big deal. More than just enabling mobile payments in a handful of partner retailers, the entire system is designed to ‘just work’ once the switch is flipped. Apple Pay will hope to become as prevalent a payment option as Visa, MasterCard or any debit card that people are already using. 

The first public Apple Pay transaction is still a few weeks away from happening, but news that Apple’s solution to mobile payments is coming, is sending shockwaves through the payments sector.

A key feature of the new iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus and Apple Watch, Apple Pay has the backing of major credit card companies, over 800 million ready-to-go credit cards on iTunes, various debit cards plus 220,000 retailers and businesses have already signed up or, at the very least, already have the necessary infrastructure to accept Apple Pay without any large investment in hardware or training.

Click to read more ...

webOS returns to mobile as a smart watch OS

LG has had the good sense to make good use of webOS as a Smart Watch operating system. The once pioneering Palm mobile OS was recently used in LG's Smart TVs and now it seems there's an earnest move to create webOS SmartWatch for developers.

One one hand, it's great to see webOS back in some form but on the other hand, manufacturers spinning off their non Android Wear wearable operating systems (Samsung's got Tizen), means fragmentation in the still-emerging wearable market. This could pose some issues for users and also for developers choosing alliances. This also tells us that manufacturers aren't keen in having Google control the whole ecosystem.

Source: Engadget

Vogue profiles Jony Ive, gets rare insight into the designer's mind

Vogue just published a rare and lengthy profile on Apple's resident design icon Jony Ive. The piece kicks off on the Apple Watch and then rather thorougly covers various aspects of Ive's personal and professional life. There's lots of information about taste, approach and passion for building things as well as Ive's partnership with Australian industrial desigenr Marc Newson who also recently joined Apple. Check out the piece here.

Apple’s payment platform tipped for debut alongside iOS 8.1

It looks like October 20 isn’t just for the debut of iOS 8.1. Bank Innovation’s Ian Kar claims Apple’s payment platform, Apple Pay, will be rolled out on that day as well. Sources close to Apple say Apple Pay will be made available for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus users once they download iOS 8.1. Mobile wallets have been around for a while but they haven’t gained much traction. We have to wait a bit more to see if Apple’s offering will encourage people to leave their wallets behind and adopt this new way to pay for purchases.

Source: Bank Innovation | Via: Business Insider