Earlier this year, Apple Pay entered the United Kingdom and now the mobile payment service is ready to extend its reach to a few other markets.
On Tuesday, Apple CEO Tim Cook reported the company earnings and announced that the iPhone maker signed a deal with American Express. Integration of Apple Pay and American express means that the mobile payment service will finally expand, headed to Canada and Australia in 2015 and Hong Kong, Spain and Singapore in 2016.
The newly-announced cooperation between American Express and Apple might give the latter an edge over Android Pay, the rival service offered by Google. Tim Cook's company has the upper hand outside the U.S., as Android Pay does not work outside American borders.
However, one advantage of the Android Pay is that it works with simple magnetic strip card readers, making it more vendor-friendly.
Apple Pay made its debut in 2014 in the form of a "mobile wallet", where iOS users can upload credit and debit card information. With the Apple Watch or iPhone, they can purchase items or services at locations across the U.S. and the U.K. that have the necessary point-of-sale equipment. Apple Pay works wirelessly, through a technology commonly known as near-field communication (NFC).
Items contained in apps can also be purchased via Apple Pay, provided that the app developers made the service compatible with the software. Names such as Uber, Amazon, Airbnb and Target proceeded to do so.
Looking at the top three credit card issuers, American Express ranks third. The first two places are occupied by Visa and MasterCard, and if Apple truly wants to be a global mobile payment provider, it will have to seal deals with them as well.
On Monday, Phoenix Marketing International reported that the hype around the service is bigger than its results. The document shows that the number of households that use Apple Pay and credit cards is at a flimsy 14%.
On the other hand, the company boasts that its service constantly gains popularity.
"We're off to a great start and we are seeing continued, double-digit monthly growth in Apple Pay transactions since launch," Apple declared recently, in a statement to Bloomberg.
It remains to be seen how Apple Pay will fare in the foreign markets, and whether or not Android Pay will extend overseas as well.
