PayPal has taken a sideways swipe at emerging mobile wallets from the likes of Google and Isis, saying that they are trying to solve a problem that doesn't exist.
Writing on the PayPal corporate blog, Anuj Nayar, senior director, global communications, argues that emerging payment brands like Google and Isis - and by implication most of the bank/telco trials underway - are scrapping to build a product that consumers don't need.
"Mobile wallets don't solve any customer pain points by themselves," he writes. "They don't offer intrinsic advantages over swiping a credit card or heaven forbid, paying cash. To gain mass adoption it has to be better, not just different, from what we do today. And your mobile phone just won't cut it."
Rather, says Nayar, the mobile phone has to be seen as a ubiquitous tool that can be serviced from the cloud to simplify the shopping experience for consumers, by feeding on geo-location and transacational data to offer up deals and coupons for both online and offline shopping as and when they are appropriate.
"Consumers need to see the value in order to switch from what they do today." he says. "That value can't just be a different way to do pay. It has to be better. It will be provided courtesy of cloud computing - not on a chip in your phone."
For this reason, insists Nayar, "do not call PayPal a mobile payments or mobile wallet company...We do not want to be lumped into a category where people are using technology to create solutions that are not solving a problem."