Google May Acquire Softcard To Improve Payments Offering

Apple jolted its rivals with Apple Pay and the sheer pace with which it is being adopted by financial institutions and merchants alike. Samsung recently acquired LoopPay for its Apple Pay rival. Google is reportedly working on a new project to counter Apple’s new payment service by reviving Wallet. A new report suggest that to further this cause Google might acquire Softcard, formerly known as ISIS, which is a payments service collectively owned and operated by the country’s major carriers.

At one time U.S. carriers weren’t interested in preloading Google Wallet on their devices because they were trying to make ISIS happen, the service was later renamed to Softcard for obvious reasons, but their attitude has reportedly been changed following Apple Pay’s launch.

According to The Wall Street Journal, Google is going to pay carriers like Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile to pre-load Wallet on the Android devices that they sell. The carrier may also give them a bigger cut of the revenues generated through ads shown inside mobile searches.

In order to make this happen Google might have to start things off by purchasing the payments service that was started by these carriers, and which has failed to gain any traction, but so far no confirmation has come from Mountain View about whether or not is is pursuing this acquisition.

Adnan Farooqui
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Apple Pay, google wallet