The Wearable POS

Bringing Wearables To The POS Frontline

What if merchants could wear the POS?

No joke.

Merchants have seen the benefits of “line busting” solutions that put mPOS tablets in the hands of a sales associate or employee.

But in the May edition of the Developer Tracker, powered by Vantiv, Jeremy Feldman, CEO of stealth startup LibriSpark, shared his vision for how merchants can now take this to the very next level: making POS not only mobile, but wearable.

Here’s a sneak peek:

It’s easy to think about commerce and wearable technology and immediately picture consumers swiping their connected devices – be it bracelets, smartwatches, rings, wristbands, etc. – in order to enable payments.

But what if the merchants instead had the power of wearables on their side? Thus enabling a business to bring the point of sale right to the consumer in a variety of merchant situations.

The solution will include both hardware and software to extend the capability and efficiency of retailers through the use of wearable technology. The POS wearable device will accept a variety of payment methods – NFC, magstripe cards, QR Code, etc. – and allow a consumer to make a payment with a merchant on the spot.

Making Things Better Together

Sometimes, it takes two.

That’s the message that software developers have seemingly embraced over the last month. Many developers announced new collaborations and partnerships, each designed to better serve merchants and their customers.

OTI PetroSmart, an On Track Innovations subsidiary, teamed up with Fuel Telematics Solutions for a new mobile payment solution for the fleet sector that will utilize beacons and NCR technology to authenticate vehicles and identify fuel stations. SumUp and payleven will also be working together, as the pair announced a merger into a new company with more than €1 billion (roughly $1.1 billion) in annual processing value and a presence in more than 15 countries.

Meanwhile, Snapchat has been working with Target and Lancôme to ramp up its new shoppable ads. Each brand will introduce 10-second ads that will allow customers to browse the brands’ mobile sites without leaving Snapchat. Finally, iboss Cybersecurity and FICO announced they are teaming up to help companies stop malware and data loss by combining the iboss security platform with cyber analytics from FICO.

The May edition of the Developer Tracker, powered by Vantiv, also features the latest news and analysis and boasts 110 developers, including 10 new additions to the Tracker.

To download the May edition of the PYMNTS.com Developer Tracker, powered by Vantiv, click the button below…

About The Tracker

The PYMNTS.com Developer Tracker, powered by Vantiv, provides the payments ecosystem with a view into how software developers are using new technologies to create innovative business opportunities and enable merchants to optimize the ways in which they engage with shoppers today. The developer community within the tracker is separated into three categories: Shopping and Payments, Operations, and Marketing.