Apple, Google and Others Form Coalition to Push Technology in Financial Sector
A handful of technology giants — including Apple, Amazon, Google, PayPal, and Intuit — have announced a partnership in the formation of the Financial Innovation Now coalition (via Re/code). The group aims to promote tech-friendly policies and changes within the financial services sector in Washington, D.C. Those behind the group will work to alter the political debate on relevant issues like tech security, mobile payments, and fraud prevention in the favor of its partners.
“A technological transformation is going to make financial services more accessible, more affordable and more secure,” said Brian Peters, executive director of Financial Innovation Now. “The challenge in Washington is making sure policy-makers understand that, and they’re comfortable with it, and they don’t apply old rules to new technology.”
Thanks to the growing popularity of mobile payments solutions like Apple Pay, Google Wallet, and PayPal, the companies behind such services are positioning themselves as part of the future in financial services discussions in Washington, since they’re more part of the conversation than ever before. The partnership also intends to work together to achieve blanket improvements for each individual service in topics like user security and authentication, faster payment processing, and “access to basic financial services for the two billion people in the world who are underserved.”
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BlackBerry Messenger gets PayPal integration new sticker packs
BlackBerry has updated their BBM application with a handful of new features. The biggest addition to the Messenger is PayPay integration, which allows users to link their PayPal accounts to their Messenger account to begin quickly sending money. There aren’t very many messaging applications that offer this kind of service, and especially ones that use something as popular as PayPal, so this is a pretty big advantage for someone looking for a new messaging replacement.
That’s not the only new feature in the update, however. BlackBerry has created a sticker club subscription that users can pay for that includes tons of new and frequently updated stickers. I’m personally not a big fan of stickers like that, but if you and your buddies send them often, it might be worth investing into just for some variety. There are a few other new tweaks to the app, including notifications for when people screenshot a private chat and customizable fonts in the Android app, so there’s some other stuff if stickers and PayPal aren’t interesting for you.
You can grab the updated app below.
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Apple and Google top Best Global Brands in 2015
Interbrand has released its latest annual ranking of the world’s most valuable brands and for the third year running, Apple and Google have topped the list. The 2015 edition of the Best Global Brands reveals that technology brands show no sign of slowing down with six out of the top ten made up of technology companies.
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For the third year running, Apple has topped the list and Google has come second, with both companies leading the list for the third year in a row. Apple is valued at $170 billion while Google is valued at $120 billion and the consultancy derives its valuation from a company’s financials, ability to influence purchase decisions and the extend that it can support premium pricing (which explains why Apple has topped the list).
Microsoft and IBM swapped places, with the Redmond-based Windows-maker valued at $68 billion in fourth place. Korean giant Samsung stayed in seventh place with a valuation of $45 billion while Amazon (who is technically classified as a retailer), is up 29 percent to $38 billion in tenth place. Other brands in the top ten include Coca-Cola, General Electric and McDonald’s.
Elsewhere on the list outside the top 10:
- Intel rank in 14th with a 4 percent increase to $35 billion
- HP dropped 3 percent to $23 billion in 18th place
- Social giant Facebook rose 54 percent to a valuation of $22 billion in 23rd place
- Camera giant Canon dropped 4 percent to $11 billion in 40th place
- Siemens ranked 53rd ($8.5 billion)
- Sony dropped 5 percent to a valuation of $8 billion in 58th place
- Panasonic rose 2 percent to $6.4 billion in 65th place
- Huawei rose a whopping 15% percent to $5 billion in 88th place
This year’s edition also saw PayPal and Lenovo enter the list at 97th and 100th place with valuations of $4.25 billion and $4.11 billion but the list isn’t great for everyone; as might be expected, troubled Finnish company Nokia joined troubled gamer Nintendo in dropping out of the list.
What do you think of the companies on (and off) the list? Let us know your views in the comments below guys!
PayPal’s new Here Chip card reader supports Android Pay for payments
Today, PayPal introduced their new “PayPal Here Chip Card Reader” for the U.S. with the aim of making on-the-go payments for small businesses easier. The reader works with the iOS and Android PayPal apps, chip card transactions, magnetic stripe, and NFC transactions including Android Pay, Samsung Pay and Apple Pay.
As companies such as Apple and Samsung, and now Google started the movement of mobile payments, PayPal came up with their own response to the trend, focusing on the ability to accept more payment options within the same point of sale system. In addition, as banks are slowly moving away from magnetic card readers in the U.S., PayPal believes that chip card technology will help update point of sales systems and bring new advantages to small businesses.
“The PayPal Here EMV reader has been available in the UK and Australia for almost two years, so we understand the market dynamics and impact of EMV on merchants. Beyond the need to accept chip card payments, merchants should view the liability shift as an opportunity to upgrade and modernize their Point of Sale systems with the latest technology that enables them to sell online, on mobile and in-person all with the same account. Future-proofing with a solution that already accepts multiple forms of payment is key to being prepared for new technologies – like contactless payments.”
The PayPal Here Chip Card Reader will be available in the U.S. on September 30th.
Source: PayPal
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‘Mighty No. 9’ demo gets a Humble Bundle and a new release date
Even though Mighty No. 9, the new crowdsourced video game from venerated MegaMan creator Keiji Inafune, won’t be available until some time in 2016, fans can still get a slice of the action. The game’s production team tweeted Friday that the game had both a new release date and that it’s playable demo has arrived on Humble Bundle. Per the game’s Kickstarter page, Mighty No. 9 will hit American consoles on February 9th, 2016 and launch worldwide on February 12th. And, according to the Mighty No. 9 official site, users must log in to Humble Bundle using the same email address as their Kickstarter/Paypal pledge and follow the download link for the Special Demo Version.
Hey Mighties! We have two big announcements for you! The MN9 Demo is LIVE on Humble Bundle. And we have a new release date!
— Mighty No. 9 (@MightyNo9) September 25, 2015
Source: Mighty No 9 (Twitter)
PayPal Sparks Speculation About Online Gaming In U.S.
Last year, an article written up at Slate speculated that online gambling would be legalised across the U.S. by the end of this decade. The article suggested that with online poker already legal in three U.S. states (Nevada, New Jersey, and Delaware), and significant pressure from major gaming companies being put on legislators, a spread is inevitable. Both types of games and regions in which those games are legal will almost undoubtedly expand between now and 2020.
It was a very sound argument from a major publication, but the truth is that Slate’s article was also one of many. It’s not exactly groundbreaking to pose a theory that the U.S. will legalise online gambling, at least in some respects. The industry potential is simply too staggering, and too much of the U.S. population is interested. The issue is just that legislation in America can be a very slow process.
But recently we got a subtle indication that some potentially major players in a hypothetical U.S. online gambling industry may be expecting things to start happening sooner rather than later. According to CNBC, PayPal has worked its way back into some budding online gambling platforms operating in the U.S. This move makes perfect sense, as there’s plenty of business for PayPal even if it’s only operating on sites active in three of the 50 American states. However, the timing has raised some eyebrows. Noise about legalisation efforts in the U.S. is getting louder by the year, and for PayPal to quietly hop on board now suggests that the company is expecting increased activity on the horizon.
As for the actual utility of PayPal for gambling sites and among paying players, the idea is to simultaneously streamline and secure the experience. While U.S. legalisation would bring about the quick emergence of a number of online gambling platforms, many see the most potential in the mobile market that would be attached to these platforms. We’ve already seen in areas of the world in which online gambling is perfectly legal that mobile gaming brings in gigantic amounts of business, and part of that comes down to providing quick gaming and payment methods.
In the UK, the Gala Bingo platform—it incidentally already includes PayPal among its various payment options—has provided a model for making gambling opportunities as accessible as possible to players. Rather than requiring an app download (which is still an option), the site actually offers QR codes that can be read by a smartphone, and which then load the Gala platform onto that phone. Alternatively, players can even send a certain text message to an arranged number and receive the platform as well. This is the sort of speed and accessibility that has made mobile casinos mutually appealing—to the casinos because they bring in business, and to players because everything is so convenient.
The integration of a payment facilitator with online gaming sites and their respective mobile branches is an extension of this convenience, and one from which PayPal stands to benefit enormously. Just as online gamblers grow used to being able to access their favourite sites’ games at the touch of a button or after a quick scan, the ability to pay instantaneously will contribute to the user experience on a broad scale.
This, in addition to the fact that PayPal is generally trusted by the public as a safe way to send and receive funds, is why PayPal and online gambling sites can be so valuable to one another. And the fact that PayPal is already moving on securing these partnerships may just be the latest indication that the U.S. is an online gambling market waiting to explode.
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