eBay raids Apple for payment talent to work on possible Apple Pay rival

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Apple in talks to bring Apple Pay to Israel
Apple Pay is setting the gold standard for mobile payments. Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac
Photo: Jim Merithew/Cult of Mac

Post-Apple Pay, everyone is looking to Cupertino when it comes to innovation in the mobile payment sector. eBay is no different — with the online auction company starting up a new division, designed especially to develop payment-related technology.

And wouldn’t you know it? It’s filling it with ex-Apple folk.

Heading the team is former Apple employee R.J. Pittman, who previously led Apple’s worldwide e-commerce platform for its online stores, from 2010-2014.

Pittman is seemingly keen to scoop up more ex-Applers, too, as he just hired Bora Chung, who also worked as a global payments technology lead for Apple’s online stores; having joined Apple at roughly the same time as Pittman.

It’s not known exactly when Chung joined eBay, but her LinkedIn profile still lists her as an Apple employee. Before that, she worked in various capacities at PayPal.

Not many details are known about eBay’s next step in the world of mobile payments, but it could well be an attempted rival to Apple Pay. Particularly as PayPal parts ways with eBay, the company is going to be pressured to debut a new payments-processing technology.

eBay executives previously described Apple Pay as a positive for mobile payments as a whole, since it will enhance acceleration and demand. “I’m hoping that the recent tokenization and Apple Pay announcements begin to accelerate the pace of NFC (near-field communication) adoption,” eBay chief executive John Donahoe has said.

eBay needs to be careful if it is thinking of competing with Apple, however. While Apple Pay has so far gone from strength to strength — with Whole Foods already reporting that Apple Pay accounts for 1 percent of all transactions, while McDonalds says 50% of all its mobile transactions are made using Apple’s technology — rival products have fared less well in the marketplace.

Last week, Amazon pulled the plug on its mobile wallet solution, Amazon Wallet, just six months after it made its debut.

Via: SFGate

 

 

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