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Posts Tagged ‘Credit Card Reader’

VeriFone credit card reader gets deal to be in Apple Stores

Filed under: Hardware, Peripherals, Apple, iPhone

The Square credit card reader for the iPhone has gotten most of the buzz around here, especially after we saw that impressive demo at Macworld a few weeks ago. But VeriFone’s competing reader has been given the green light by Apple itself: the unit has been granted a deal for shelf space. VeriFone will be selling its PAYware Mobile units inside Apple’s retail stores coming up as soon as the end of March.

I’m not quite sure what the reasoning is behind this one on Apple’s side, as the PAYware service seems to be a little more clunky than the Square solution: you have to pay both an activation fee and a monthly fee on top of the per-payment charge that Square asks for, and the reader itself is much bigger, taking up the iPhone’s dock rather than just using the headphone port like Square’s. Whatever Apple saw in them, you’ll be able to get VeriFone’s system right along with an iPhone or iPod touch all at the same time..

No matter which system eventually prevails (if indeed anyone needs to prevail at all — there’s certainly more than one credit card company, so there’s no reason why there couldn’t be more than one payment system on the iPhone), this does seems like a model that will change a lot of business transactions in all sorts of industries. It’ll be interesting to see how the curve takes off once these things are up and running.

TUAWVeriFone credit card reader gets deal to be in Apple Stores originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Fri, 05 Mar 2010 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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iPhone credit card reader to be demoed at CES

Filed under: Hardware, iPhone, App Store

Coming this CES (which is actually next week): a complete credit card transaction accessory and service for your iPhone. If this thing works as expected, you might actually see it in more than a few places (think: street vendors that will take credit card payments). A company called Mophie is planning to show off an add-on that works with an app to deliver credit card payments through Square, a payment service recently started up by Jack Dorsey, a Twitter alumni. This is one of a couple such systems that will be vying to fulfill the function (and probably take a few cents from each transaction for their troubles), but so far all we’ve really got is demos, no actual releases planned.

But maybe we’ll hear more at CES. There’s all kinds of applications here — a solid, working implementation of a service like this could end up being extremely popular for anybody that regularly needs to conduct transactions out in the field.

TUAWiPhone credit card reader to be demoed at CES originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Thu, 31 Dec 2009 18:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Mophie iPhone credit card reader coming to a CES near you

iPhone accessory maker and recession antidote regular Mophie is about to make the most buzzworthy move of its short history by offering a credit card reader and accompanying transaction app for the Apple handset. Positioned as a direct competitor to Jack Dorsey’s Square iPhone Payment System, Mophie’s solution looks to be integrated into an iPhone case — making it possible to keep the reader on permanently, albeit at a slight cost to your device’s aesthetics. The decidedly cube-shaped Square system has a less ergonomic design, but we suspect that the winner (if either of these two succeeds) will be primarily determined by the usability of the app and affordability of the service. Look out for more info to emerge at some point during the maelstrom that will be CES 2010.

Mophie iPhone credit card reader coming to a CES near you originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 31 Dec 2009 04:19:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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5 O’Clock Roundup: Apple’s mysterious event, iPhone credit card reader, Evernote hits 2M,

Here’s the latest action:

Apple’s Jan. 26 announcement? — Chasing the Financial Times, Fox News reports it has confirmed that Apple will announce a new product in San Francisco that day. Is it a tablet or an e-book reader? The tongues are wagging.

Mophie plans credit-card reader for the iPhone — It looks cool, but this Mophie product might fall into the nice but totally unnecessary department. The company normally makes battery packs and cases, but this device gives you an alternative to typing your credit card into various apps by hand. It’s aimed at small business owners.

Evernote hits 2 million users – The life-capture application has hit its second million in less than half the time it took to get its first million. Part of the reason is that it launched a popular app on the iPhone.

CES rumor mill – The biggest U.S. tech trade show isn’t until next week, but the rumors are flooding out. Motorola is reported launching two new phones next week, including an Android-based phone, according to analyst Trip Chowdhry.

The tragedy of One Laptop Per Child — One more design has been shelved, prompting predictions that this effort to educate the world’s poor children through laptops is a failure.

iPhone taking off in China? — The world’s most populous country hasn’t held out the welcome mat for the iPhone. But Apple may be having some success there with sales lately.

New TiVO on the way? — A packaging mishap may be a clue to whether TiVO is preparing to launch a new digital video recorder, sans dialup modem and including a cable card slot.

Seagate ex-engineer testifies against company — The engineer claims that Seagate had access to trade secrets from Convolve when it designed noise-reduction technology into its hard drives that infringed the latter’s patents.

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What do you do after you start Twitter? Invent a credit card reader.

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Hardware, Retail, Odds and ends, iPhone, iPod touch

If you were Jack Dorsey, one of the co-founders and current chairman of Twitter, you’d want to think about something else big to follow up on your huge success.

While it doesn’t sound like anything groundbreaking, Dorsey’s new company Square is developing a tiny white cube (see photo above) that plugs into the headphone jack on either an iPhone or iPod touch. The cube is a credit card reader, something missing from all of those credit card apps currently in the iTunes App Store.

The Square iPhone Payment System consists of the reader and an app. After a card swipe, the customer uses a finger to sign the iPod touch or iPhone, one of the participants in the transaction enters the customer’s email address, and a receipt with the location of the transaction, the signature, and other standard information is emailed to the customer.

While most online journalists are anticipating that this device and software are going to be used in retail (can you say Apple Store?), I think Dorsey has bigger ideas – let’s face it, the guy doesn’t think small. So why not make it possible for anyone with an iPhone or iPod touch to be able to accept credit cards for payments? Word has it that the card reader’s manufacturing price will be as low as US$0.40, which means that Square could give away the readers and still make money on the transaction fees.

[via Engadget]

TUAWWhat do you do after you start Twitter? Invent a credit card reader. originally appeared on The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW) on Mon, 19 Oct 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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