Samsung Pay is apparently off to a strong start, as the service reportedly topped one million users in its home country of South Korea.
In today's mobile-driven world, mobile payments solutions have come to play a big role. Heavyweight companies are already racing to offer their services in this area and Samsung Pay is among the top contenders, competing against the likes of Apple Pay and Android Pay.
Samsung Pay is a mobile payment service that works with select Samsung Galaxy smartphones, aiming to provide a simple solution for users to pay with their smartphone. According to Samsung, its service stands out from the crowd due to its wide compatibility with merchant payment systems, working at more merchants than any other solution of its kind.
A new report out of Samsung's home country of South Korea now signals an impressive performance for the relatively-new service. Korea Times claims that Samsung Pay has already topped one million users in the country, although it's only been available for a couple of months. During this time, Samsung Pay reportedly handled more than 100,000 daily payments, amounting to a total of nearly $90 million.
It seems that Samsung Pay is so successful in South Korea thanks to the company's powerful marketing campaign. Samsung reportedly held several public marketing events designed to demonstrate just how easy it is to pay with Samsung Pay, encouraging more users to try the service if they have compatible Samsung smartphones.
According to the report, an increasing number of users are apparently relying on the service to pay for their daily purchases at supermarkets, department stores, restaurants and cafes, but Samsung Pay use for public transport and at cinemas is at a record-high as well.
At the same time, the report notes that more than half the people who purchased the Galaxy Note 5 also signed up for Samsung Pay. In addition to the Galaxy Note 5, Samsung Pay also works with the Galaxy S6, Galaxy S6 Edge and Galaxy S6 Edge+.
"Samsung Pay has seen its subscriber base expand at a rapid pace," said a company official, as cited by the Korea Times. "We will continue to make efforts to offer better services by developing more convenient, customer-centric functions and by providing marketing promotion events for the payment service."
Samsung Pay is not expanding just in South Korea, however. On Oct. 21, Samsung announced that its mobile payments service has expanded its availability in the U.S. as well, now working with all major U.S. carriers - including Verizon.
At this rate, Samsung Pay looks poised to grow even further, but it remains to be seen whether it will be as successful worldwide as it is in its home market. While the service is indeed easy to use and has the benefit of working with most existing payment systems at most merchants, it also has the drawback of supporting only a few banks, at least in the U.S.
