Right now is the inflection point for the smartphones market, and companies which understand consumer behaviour will survive in the future, said a top Samsung India Electronics official.

“Five years in the handsets or telecom industry is a lifetime in itself. The world will become completely virtual in five years. It will be very different in every single aspect, most importantly the consumer aspect — what they do with devices. And, devices will look wholly different,” Asim Warsi, Senior Vice-President, Samsung India Electronics, told Businessline in interview.

He said that’s why the company thought it is important to come out with different consumer experiences. One such example is Samsung Pay — a platform that can be used to make purchases by swiping or tapping a debit/credit card to make payments — which was launched on Wednesday.

The company has registered cards, and integrated Paytm and the Centre’s Unified Payments Interface into the app. Samsung has also created a unique digital payment ecosystem by partnering with a number of issuers and card networks, including Visa, MasterCard, American Express, Axis Bank, HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, SBI Card and Standard Chartered Bank.

Citibank India is a forthcoming issuer and its credit cards will shortly be live on Samsung Pay, the company said.

“Our insights show that convenience, security and acceptance are seen by consumers as the most important influencers when choosing different digital payment options. With Samsung Pay, we give our consumers the smartest way to make digital transactions, by far,” Warsi said.

He claimed Samsung Pay is “highly secure” through the signature Knox platform, fingerprint authentication and tokenisation. To launch Samsung Pay, a user needs to swipe on an eligible Samsung Galaxy smartphone, select the card, authenticate using a fingerprint or PIN and bring the phone near the point of sale (PoS) terminal.

“It works with Samsung’s patented magnetic secure transmission (MST) technology as well as with near-field communication (NFC). MST replicates a card swipe by wirelessly transmitting magnetic waves from the supported Samsung device to a standard card reader. Through MST, Samsung Pay works seamlessly on 95 per cent of PoS terminals in India.”

In India, most retail shops already have regular PoS machines with magnetic card readers, which are compatible with MST technology, making Samsung Pay particularly suited to the India market, Warsi said.

Select devices

However, Samsung Pay will be available in only a few handsets, and that too in the premium segment (priced above ₹20,000), including Galaxy S7 edge, Galaxy S7, Galaxy Note 5, Galaxy S6 edge+, Galaxy A5 (2016), Galaxy A7 (2016), Galaxy A5 (2017) and Galaxy A7 (2017).

But, gradually the company plans to expand the portfolio and start providing the app in ‘affordable’ smartphones, too, “depending on the popularity and the demand experience”.

Since its launch in July 2015, Samsung Pay has expanded its service by supporting additional value-added features in multiple markets worldwide. With its launch in India, Samsung Pay is fully available in 12 global markets — South Korea, the US, China, Spain, Singapore, Australia, Puerto Rico, Brazil, Russia, Thailand and Malaysia.

The platform will also be available on the Samsung Gear S3 Smartwatch shortly, allowing users to pay through their wearable device, the company added.

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