Competitive Strategies

Processor First Data Corp.’s strategy of providing payments integration to independent software vendors appears to be yielding results. The Atlanta-based company said it signed 94 ISVs in the second quarter. That, along with good growth in its direct-sales channel, contributed to the 17.1% growth in second-quarter revenue in First Data’s …

Joe Kaplan, the chief executive of merchant processor Paya and former president of the Electronic Transactions Association’s board of directors, died unexpectedly last week, the ETA announced. Kaplan was the former CEO of Total Merchant Services and founded Innovative Merchant Solutions, which he sold to Intuit Inc. in 2003 and …

The independent sales organization business is one that has spawned multimillion-dollar fortunes for numerous entrepreneurs. But perhaps it’s time for the industry to begin thinking beyond pure profit, merchant-acquiring executives suggested Thursday. The executives participated in a panel dubbed “Payments Doing Good” at the MidWest Acquirers Association annual conference in …

Processor Stripe launched Stripe Issuing, a platform to aid merchants creating their own credit and debit cards. The service enables developers and businesses to create physical or virtual cards with a single application programming interface call to the platform. Stripe said it is not issuing cards directly to consumers. Physical cards …

Restaurant-services specialist LevelUp is being sold to Grubhub Inc. for $390 million. Announced Wednesday, the deal weds Boston-based LevelUp, with its expertise in digital ordering, payment, and loyalty, with Grubhub’s online and mobile food-ordering services. Chicago-based Grubhub also owns the Seamless, Eat24, AllMenus, and MenuPages brands. The deal is an …

Mastercard Inc. posted a 33% increase in second-quarter profit as its worldwide purchase volumes rose nearly 16% and U.S. volume grew 10.5%. New business wins, including cobranded cards, and more customers for existing products drove the higher numbers. “We continue to make excellent progress with cobrands,” Mastercard chief executive Ajay …

Person-to-person payments are hot these days, and PayPal Holdings Inc. has one of the hottest products in the market with its Venmo service. But as PayPal revealed Wednesday, Venmo can create some friction for its parent even as it vitally expands its payments business. PayPal reported $14.2 billion in payment …

Dunkin’ Brands Group Inc. expanded its licensing agreement with CardFree Inc., the technology provider for the Dunkin’ Donuts mobile app. The deal includes a perpetual license to the CardFree software and greater control over the mobile-payments technology. Dunkin’ Brands also is licensed to use the technology for future services, including …

An integrated payments strategy appears to be paying off for processor Total System Services Inc. (TSYS). The Columbus, Ga.-based company says it signed 45 new integrated payments partners in the second quarter. “Coupled with a strong pipeline of software providers across a diverse set of verticals, we believe this high-growth …

When it comes to the potential for Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies to be a real-world payment method, users, investors, and blockchain executives have a somewhat mixed view on the matter. Asked whether they think more merchants will start accepting crypto this year, 49% agree and 23% strongly agree that they …