Apple Pay hasn’t quite been the card-busting life-changing revolution that some might have expected, but even so, it’s humming along quite nicely. Well enough, in fact, that an envious Google may buy up mobile payments company Softcard to provide a little competition.
According to a TechCrunch report, Google is in talks to acquire the mobile payments vendor formerly known as ISIS for around $US100 million. The company is a joint venture between AT&T, Verizon and T-Mobile, and basically works a lot like Apple Pay, letting you use the NFC in your phone (or a case) to pay for stuff without all that hard work of getting a card out.
Softcard never really took off, and the company is in a financial tough spot, burning $US500,000 per day and recently laying off 60 employees. That probably accounts for the low price — $US100 million is bargain basement price for a mature, functioning mobile payments system with the backing of the mobile phone networks. According to the report, PayPal and Microsoft are also thinking about snapping the company up. Did someone say bidding war? [TechCrunch]