USA Technologies Grows m-Payments Vending Portfolio

M&M Sales Company, a full-service vending company that distributes food, drinks and commercial products to individuals through businesses, will integrate USA Technologies (USAT) to expand Cashless Systems to all its vending machines. The move, which translates into a five-year exclusive agreement, will allow customers to pay with their cards or mobile wallets such as Apple Pay, Google Wallet, Samsung Pay and all other NFC payment devices. Taking into account that two in five Americans will use Mobile Wallets in 2017, as Business Insider reported a year ago, the strategic partnership is timely.

USA Technologies provides wireless, cashless payment and M2M/IoT solutions for self-service retail industries such as vending, car wash and parking. A third-generation family business, M&M Sales Company operates 25 full-service vending routes servicing approximately 4,000 vending machines and single-cup coffee brewers as well as a growing number of micro-market locations.

Credit, debit and mobile payments will be made possible via USAT’s ePort Mobile and ePort Online solutions. The partnership will also include loyalty programs and consumer experience enhancements across all of their evolving business segments. Building on its more than five-year relationship with USAT, the company plans to equip all of its machines within the next five years to achieve 100 percent wireless connectivity and cashless payment capabilities.

“Our partnership with M&M Sales Company is a great example of how smart, forward-thinking companies that service a wide variety of consumer profiles are evolving to adopt cashless and mobile payment technology,” said Steve Herbert, Chairman and CEO of USA Technologies, in the press release. “Cashless and mobile payments are no longer the ‘future,’ they are the ‘now.’ We look forward to partnering with M&M in the planning and deployment of ePort Connect and collaborating on marketing initiatives which we believe would bring more value to their customer base, increase efficiencies and drive additional sales and participation across the board.”

In a similar move, USAT brought Apple Pay to around 200,000 vending machines or self-serve payment terminals – which include everything from coffee brewers to vending machines, kiosks, laundry equipment and pay parking terminals.

Old-fashioned vending machines are on the rise of becoming smarter and highly connected devices. According to Osama Bedier, former head of Google Payments, vending machines are still 95 percent cash-based, so the potential for modernization is huge. Last year’s IP 2014 Expo saw, for instance, PayRange, a company that offers an easy-to-set-up mobile payment system for vending machines, attract an unusually large list of some of the best-connected mobile investors in the industry with an almost $2.75 million funding round.