Earlier in the year at the Mobile World Congress, representatives from LG stated that mobile Payments was an area of interest for the firm. The statements came as LG UPlus, a South Korean cellular operator and subsidiary of LG, had already introduced a mobile payment solution for users of its system called Paynow.
Following those statements from LG in March, the firm appears closer to launching a payment system that is integrated within their phones. Earlier this month it launched the LG V10, its new flagship phone, which had among its key features a fingerprint sensor. Among competitors such as Apple and Samsung, fingerprint authentication has been a prelude to launching a payment system. In addition, LG was found to have filed a trademark in the US and South Korea for the G Pay name.
The emergence of G Pay would add LG to the list of mobile firms that have launched payment systems, now including Apple Pay, Samsung Pay and Android Pay. However, despite a crowded market, demand for mobile payments appears to be strong, with Samsung Pay’s launch in South Korea having exceeded company estimates in its first month.
Within the US, mobile payments are expected to get a boost from EMV payment transaction liability going into effect at the beginning of October. The changes being put into effect by credit card companies and payment network operators are that merchants are liable for fraudulent banking card transactions placed using magnetic strip point of sale (POS) terminals. As a result of the changes, merchants can avoid liability by putting in place EMV compliant, pin-code POS terminals. For the mobile payment sector, this is viewed as a positive trend due to new POS hardware include NFC technology for smartphone based payments.
