Currently, LG Pay is restricted to the LG G6 and LG G6 Plus in South Korea but hopes to enter the international market soon.
Launched at the beginning of June in South Korea, LG Pay now announces ambitious plans to expand to more smartphones and new markets next year. LG is looking forward to entering the international market to provide competition to such rival services as Samsung Pay and Apple Pay.
According to local research firm Wiseapp, the number of LG Pay users accounts for 95,000 while Samsung Pay has already attracted 5.2 million.
Currently, LG Pay is restricted to the LG G6 and LG G6 Plus in South Korea and only works offline. Next year, LG Pay will be available on “low-budget smartphones” and online shopping malls though the company doesn’t reveal exact smartphones that will get the support for its mobile payment service.
“We will expand the use of LG Pay into low-budget smartphones alongside premium phones next year,” Cho Jun-ho, President of LG’s Mobile Communication Division, said.
LG Pay differs from Samsung Pay with Magnetic Security Transmission (MST) as it is based on the Wireless Magnetic Communication (WMC) technology. Credit card from four issuers — Shinhan, KB, BC, and Lotte — support the service but LG promises to make it work with all major cards in South Korea by the end of September.
As expected, LG Pay is very easy to use. You just place the device near a payment terminal and approve the purchase with your fingerprint. Just two actions are needed to process a transaction. In this way, the operating principle of all available mobile payment systems such as Samsung Pay or Android Pay is equal.
The market of mobile payment providers now offers a great amount of options so we can say that LG is late to the game. But it is always possible to find potential customers as the space still has enough room to grow. LG Pay still can enter the US market in time to at least capture a sizable share of the market.
The whole process of LG Pay launch was not easy. Initially, LG was planning to announce its payment service in 2016 but postponed the event until 2017. Testing problem was stated as a reason for delay. Reportedly, LG was also waiting for the regulatory approval for the service and the White Card physical cards were not so far available in the company’s home country.
In March, LG delayed the launch of payment service for the second time. The release was scheduled for June this time and finally the service was successfully launched.
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