Chase Pay to compete with Apple, Google and Samsung in 2016

JPMorgan Chase has announced plans to foray into the digital wallets space in mid-2016 by launching its own mobile payment platform – Chase Pay. On Monday (26 October), the bank said it would compete directly with other mobile wallets such as Apple Pay, Android Pay and Samsung Pay.

The largest bank in the US has signed a deal with Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX), a group of large retailers, to accept payments via Chase Pay. MCX generate more than $1tn of business each year across 100,000 stores that include larger retailers such as Walmart, Target, Shell and BestBuy.

Gordon Smith, chief executive of the bank's consumer business said that this tie-up is a key advantage to the company, because of the caliber of retailers it brings on board. The Chase Pay app will work on both Apple and Android-based smartphones and at the time of its launch, it will be available to the 94 million users who currently hold the bank's credit, debit or prepaid cards.

JPMorgan Chase entered the mobile wallet space to profit from the increasing number of smartphone users using the payment gateway, which many financial executives believe would be the preferred mode of payment for transactions in future.

Apple Pay

Apple launched its mobile wallet app in September 2014. It has however struggled to sign up with large retailers. However, earlier this month, it tied up with restaurants such as Starbucks, KFC and Chili's and retailer BestBuy to accept payments via Apple Pay.

Brendan Miller, analyst with Forrester Research, said that the Cupertino-based company, with its large user base could be best positioned to win the digital payment race. He added, "They brought together NFC technology, they brought together tokenization and biometrics and they combined those three things to create a really frictionless consumer experience at the point of sale."

Android Pay

The search engine giant re-launched its Google Wallet. It has partnered with companies such as American Express, MasterCard and Visa to facilitate integration of Android Pay in the US, with plans for a global launch later.

Sridhar Ramaswamy, Google's senior vice president of ads and commerce said, that its mobile wallet was available at more than a million locations and is growing each day.

Samsung Pay

The new payments app by the South Korean giant, will be available to Samsung smartphone users starting Wednesday, 28 October 2015. It was reported earlier that it had partnered with MasterCard ahead of its launch in Europe. Reports also stated that the company could extend its NFC-driven mobile payment services to its next-gen smartwatch and across budget smartphones.