Car key, ring, wristband, …
Smartphone payments are becoming more common nowadays, but MasterCard wants to go one step further as the American payment company wants to enable payments through smart wearables (like watches, jewelry, clothing and even car keys). These “wearable devices” will have to have secured communication chips, something it hopes to get out of a collaboration with Dutch chip company NXP and its American competitor Qualcomm.
Several well-known manufacturers have already started designing products: car giant GM is developing a key chain, Ringly is working on a ring, while Nymi is developing a smart wristband which eliminates the need to bring out the actual MasterCard. Just keep the “smart device” against the payment terminal and that is that.
The first items should be available early 2016, first in the United States, but only Capital One MasterCards would be able to use these items in the beginning, it seems. Nevertheless, MasterCard feels confident several other American banks will follow suit. In any case: first America, then the (rest of the) world.
