Major Stores Form Mobile Wallet Company

Whether or not customers are ready, companies and stores are gearing up to take cellphone payments in the future. Wal-Mart, Best Buy, 7-Eleven and other stores have joined to form a company that will set up a smartphone payment system, the stores announced Wednesday (Aug. 15).

The new cooperative is called the Merchant Customer Exchange and comprises retailers that draw in $1 trillion in sales annually. The exchange hasn't yet offered many details on how their system would work or when it would start, the New York Times reported.  

The exchange joins several recent corporate moves into the mobile wallet market. Earlier this month, the mobile payment startup Square announced a partnership with Starbucks. Soon after that, all four major U.S. cellphone service carriers announced they're forming a Mobile Payments Committee with Google, ISIS, PayPal and other companies.

Source: http://www.livescience.com/22439-major-stores-form-mobile-wallet-company.html