Samsung reportedly planning to expand its payment service to non-Samsung smartphones

After expanding its payment service to higher mid-range smartphones like the Galaxy A5 (2017) and the Galaxy A7 (2017) earlier this year, and more recently, to the mid-range Galaxy J7 Pro, Samsung is looking to expand the availability of Samsung Pay. It is now being reported that the company is planning to bring its payment service to at least two more mid-range smartphones later this year. Not only that, the South Korean smartphone giant wants to compete with Apple Pay and Android Pay by bringing Samsung Pay to smartphones from rival brands.

According to a report from Gadgets360, Samsung has internally decided to bring Samsung Pay to flagship smartphones from rival brands. This would require OEMs to use Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST) specific hardware in their smartphones. Moreover, Samsung is also considering to launch an attachment that would work with the Samsung Pay app on smartphones from other OEMs and brands. Either or both strategies could be finalised, a source said Gadgets360. The company is reportedly planning to bring its payment service to the first non-Samsung smartphone by mid-2018.

According to market research firm Juniper, Samsung Pay (with its 34 million users worldwide) stands at the second position in the mobile payments segment after Apple Pay, which is said to have around 80 million users. Android Pay, with its 24 million users, is at the third position. Samsung is aggressively working to bring Samsung Pay to more smartphones and markets. It had launched the service earlier this year in India, and it works with the country’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) as well as third-party wallet apps like Paytm.