Apple Pay has only been live for one week, but Apple’s already got some welcome news — according to Mr Cook himself, Apple’s fledgling payment system has hit the ground running, and already overshadows other NFC payment systems. Score one for Cupertino.
Speaking at the WSJ.D Live event, Apple’s CEO said that Apple Pay has already seen more than one million activations, which Cook says is more than the total of “the other guys”. That’s certainly not a shabby number, but it’s worth bearing in mind that activations doesn’t equal purchases, and as we’ve seen from the kickback from retailers, Apple’s struggle might be with getting merchants on board, rather than encouraging us little consumers to activate Apple Pay.
In fact, that’s a topic that Cook touched on during the interview — saying that “you’re only relevant as a merchant if your customers love you”. That stands in pretty stark contrast to what other merchants are saying. A spokesperson from Walmart, which essentially leads the opposition to Apple Pay, CurrentC, told Business Insider today that they have just got consumers’ best interests in mind by not supporting Apple Pay. It will be interesting to see who wins this tussle, but it certainly seems that Apple’s been able to make significant inroads into the payments arena thus far. [WSJ, The Verge]