Isis rethinks mobile payment plans
Isis will instead work within traditional systems that rely on major credit card companies like Visa and MasterCard to process mobile transactions.
The carriers in Isis - AT&T, Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile US - will still move ahead with a pilot test planned for 2012 in Salt Lake City of a system using near-field communication technology inside smartphones.
Cnet says sources close to the project claim the carriers plan to set up a mobile wallet that can store and exchange account information from credit cards that subscribers already use.
As part of this plan, the carriers are in talks with Visa and MasterCard to have them participate in the payment offering. Then they will work with handset makers to embed the information and technology into devices.
The main reason for the shift in strategy is that setting up a separate network is too difficult and time-consuming, according to the consortium.
According to PC World, the service originally planned to bypass the traditional credit card companies altogether, as charges would appear directly on consumer's cellular phone bills.
Discover was originally the key partner in the effort, but its market share; only 3.3% share of credit card transactions, likely gave retailers pause on dealing with the group. Eighty-five percent of all credit transactions are processed through Visa or MasterCard.
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