Samsung bought LoopPay for around $250 million, sources say

Back in February, Samsung acquired LoopPay, a start-up based in Massachusetts, to bolster its presence in the mobile payment game and help it better compete with the likes of Google’s Wallet, PayPal and the relatively new Apple Pay system. At the time, it wasn’t known how much the transaction had cost Samsung, but now various sources suggest that the price tag was approximately $250 million. This number could rise further based on any performance related earnouts, although such terms are unknown.

A Samsung spokeswoman and LoopPay CEO Will Graylin both declined to comment on the figure.

LoopPay’s technology is important for Samsung as it allows its new phones, like the Galaxy S6, to mimic a regular card swipe, meaning that Samsung Pay should work everywhere that currently accepts card payments. This gives it an advantage over Apple Pay or Google Wallet, which requires the retailer to accommodate NFC transactions. Samsung has also said that its payment platform will be compatible with NFC, which is gradually gaining presence in retails stores.

In related news, Samsung has announced that it will be closing down its Samsung Wallet service on June 30^th. Tickets and reservations will still be available after this date, but no new transactions will be accepted after the end of June.

LoopPay is an important part of the upcoming Samsung Pay system.

The company didn’t give a reason for the closure, but it’s probably safe to say that the launch build-up to Samsung Pay might have something to do with it. All we know so far is that Samsung is planning to launch its new payment system sometime in H2 2015. September is seen as a likely candidate, given that the IFA trade show and the launch of the Galaxy Note 5 will take place that month.

LoopPay also previously announced they would make mobile payment-enabled cases for Samsung’s Galaxy Note 4 and Galaxy S5 handsets that would release sometime in 2015, which should help Samsung expand its mobile payment ecosystem.

Whether or not LoopPay will help Samsung become the dominant force in mobile payments remains to be seen. But mobile companies seem convinced that their products and systems will replace our debit and credit cards in the not too distant future.

5 tips to improve the Galaxy S6 Edge’s battery life

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One of the biggest changes in the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge is the lack of a removable battery, and this means you’re stuck with the 2600-mAh battery that comes built into the handset. As we covered in our Galaxy S6 Edge battery life review, my usage means that I get on average 14 to 18 hours battery life.  However, like with most Android smartphones, there are a few simple tips to make the most of your S6 Edge battery.

Display Brightness

The first tip is about display brightness and this makes a huge difference to your battery life. It’s a common fact that the brighter your display, the worse your battery life gets and this definitely applies to the Galaxy S6 Edge.

For me personally, keeping brightness on auto and between 40 and 60 percent is the perfect balance between battery life and display quality, but this is a personal decision. You can also try reducing screen time-out and changing other display settings by heading over to Settings > Display.

Smart Network Switch

Smart Network Switch is a Samsung feature that’s been present on the past few generations of Galaxy handsets and it is both good and bad. The good is that it monitors your mobile and Wi-Fi networks and uses whichever is strongest when you access data. The downside is the effect on your battery life from all that scanning.

I personally keep this disabled as I mostly use my handset on 4G – EE’s 4G network is often faster than my home Wi-Fi network – but even when it’s turned on, I’ve found it to be more hindrance than help.

To switch this off, head over to Wi-Fi Setting, tap on More and then select Smart Network Switch. From here, you can turn it on or off based on your personal preference.

Android Location

One of the biggest issues with all Android smartphones is the platform’s inability to manage location efficiently without negatively affecting battery life. Thankfully, there’s a plethora of options to help preserve your battery life, so from the notifications menu, press and hold the Location button to bring up location settings.

From here, change the Location Method:

• GPS, Wi-Fi and mobile networks – this lets Google use any of these to find your location even if Wi-Fi or location is turned off. When this is switched on, you’ll often find Google Play Services is one of the biggest issues.
• Wi-Fi and mobile networks – this disables the GPS chip inside your Galaxy S6 Edge and is probably the least useful of the three options. Relying on just mobile networks and Wi-Fi will allow you to find your location quickly but will then use a lot of data and battery as it relies on your Wi-Fi and mobile networks to keep track of your location.
• GPS only – this is actually the mode I use as it prevents Google scanning in the background (more on that below). It has its pitfalls in that it can take a while to find your location but the battery savings from not having Google scanning are plentiful.

When you attempt to turn on either the first or the second option, you’re greeted with a prompt from Google to “Improve location accuracy”. The option means that anonymous location data can sporadically be sent to Google even when no apps are running, and as a result, this can have a large impact on your battery life, especially when using Google Now or widgets that depend on location.

Google Sync Services

Another of the issues that affects all Android smartphones is Google’s Sync Services; the beauty of Android is that you can add a Google account and it syncs all your services, but the pitfalls come in when you have multiple Google accounts set up.

When you do add a second, third, or more Google account, the handset automatically turns on sync for all of Google’s own apps and services. For me personally, I have one account that has everything syncing and the rest are for email so once I add an account, I go into that account and turn off all the services.

To turn off sync services, head over to Settings and then tap on Accounts. On the next menu select Google and then tap on your Google account. You’ll now be presented with a list of services; to disable any of them, just tap the toggle to the right of the name.

Bloatware

The last tip is an interesting one as the Galaxy S6 Edge is the least bloated Samsung smartphone ever made. Alongside the new build, camera and aesthetics, the Galaxy S6 Edge comes with a redefined TouchWiz interface that includes a handful of preloaded apps and the ability to disable most of these.

I personally disable preloaded apps that I don’t use mainly to prevent it from running in the background and in the case of the Galaxy S6 Edge, the few apps that I have disabled are S Voice (which you should disable on every Samsung smartphone), OneNote and OneDrive.

To disable an app, head over to your App Drawer and then tap on the Edit button in the top right corner. Now the appearance will change and any app that you can disable will have a small line in the top left corner. To disable a preloaded app, find that app in your app drawer and then tap on the line; the next screen will prompt you to disable the app and if the app has been updated, you might also need to uninstall all updates (follow on screen prompts).

Wrap up

There you have it; five simple tips to getting the most out of your Galaxy S6 Edge battery. Most of the tips apply to any Android smartphone and in the case of location and bloat, these are things I do on every Android phone I use.

These tips won’t add drastic amounts to your battery life but especially in the case of the display brightness, it can mean a few extra hours battery life. If you’re someone who uses your phone a lot – and we mean 5 hours screen on time – chances are you’ll need to charge it more than once a day but actually, this isn’t a problem.

I use Quick Charging all the time as it can add up to 50 percent to the battery with just 30 minutes of charging, which means charging more than once per day really isn’t an issue (at least for me).

I personally think the trade-off between features and battery life is worth it, but what do you think? Have any of these tips helped you or is there something we’ve missed? Let us know your thoughts, guys!

Press renders of the Samsung Galaxy S6 Active get dropped by @evleaks

You know the old saying: you can never keep a good man down. Despite retiring from the business of leaking, @evleaks has again come out of the woodwork to drop this gem on the Internet’s doorstep – press renders of the Samsung Galaxy S6 Active. This comes just a day after we got our first look at the tank-like S6 Active and both images seem to correlate the design of the device to a T. What’s interesting is that both images depict an AT&T variant of the S6 Active which begs the question – are any of the other U.S. carriers going to carry the device, and where will it be available?

Thanks to these two leaks in the space of a few days, we can be relatively certain that Samsung is gearing up to make an announcement soon, so we won’t have to wonder what’s on the inside of these devices for long, however esterday’s leak did suggest that the S6 Active would step up its battery size to 3,500mAh, a big step up from the Galaxy S6’s 2,600mAh. If I’m honest, I quite like the camo finish on today’s S6 Active leak, though that could just be me.

What do you think about today’s Samsung Galaxy S6 Active leak? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below.

Source: Twitter via Phandroid

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