Competitive Strategies

How people purchased goods and services online, at the in-store point of sale (POS), or on mobile devices changed significantly during the pandemic. Whether or not businesses closed their brick-and-mortar storefronts, they experienced a shift to contactless and online channels as a safer way to transact for businesses and consumers.  …

Square Inc. announced Thursday the addition of three inventory-management features to its cloud-based retail-management app, Square for Retail. Merchants can use the new features to build an inventory library, track inventory by warehouse or store, transfer stock as needed, and reorder inventory with one click. The new features arrive as …

Deluxe Corp. is best known as the largest supplier of checks in the United States, but early Thursday it showed how serious it is about staking a major claim in digital payments. The Shoreview, Minn.-based company announced it has agreed to pay $960 million in cash for First American Payment …

Discover Financial Services reported $1.6 billion in net income in the 2021 first quarter, a reversal of a $61 million loss in the same quarter in 2020. Discover said its payment services volume was $75.9 billion, a 19% increase year-over-year. Dollar volume on its Pulse debit network increased 23% year-over-year, driven …

Amazon.com Inc. is expanding its Amazon One biometric payment technology to Whole Foods stores in Seattle. Amazon, which launched Amazon One in its two Seattle Amazon Go stores last September, will initially roll the technology out to a Whole Foods store near its headquarters and eventually to seven more stores …

The buy now, pay later trend has eased online purchases for consumers over the past year, but at the other end of those transactions is the flow of returns after buyers get their merchandise. Now Affirm Holdings Inc., a leading player in the fast-growing BNPL arena has attacked the issue with …

French processor Worldline S.A. reported its first-quarter merchant-services revenue dropped 8.7% year-over-year to 517 million euros ($621 million), while its terminals and software unit saw a 16.5% decline to 266 million euros ($320 million). Worldline acquired terminal maker Ingenico Group S.A. in October.FIS Inc. said it has won a domestic acquiring license for its Worldpay …

North America has emerged as the largest sales-generating region for buy now, pay later provider Afterpay Ltd. In the Australia-based company’s latest financial results, North America sales accounted for A$2.6 billion (US$2 billion) in the third quarter ended March 30. Only Australia and New Zealand approach that volume. Overall, Afterpay said …

Some 83% of consumers said they had used a QR code in the past year to make a payment or complete a financial transaction, with 54% of those persons saying they had used a QR code for those purposes for the first time in only the past three months. Still, just 39% …

With its name change having become official Monday, Cantaloupe Inc. is looking to start a new chapter in the company’s history as it embarks on a strategy to penetrate new segments of the unattended retail market and grow its business internationally. As part of the change from USA Technologies Inc., …