Ever since its beginnings in the 1980s, Verifone has been known as a major global provider of point-of-sale (POS) technology and innovative solutions for the merchant payments industry.
After three decades of being a dominant market player, Verifone is more than just a provider of credit card terminals; the company is seen as a respected enabler of retail commerce around the world. The company, which these days is headquartered in Silicon Valley, believes that the introduction of the Europay, MasterCard and Visa (EMV) system in the United States is one of the most complex challenges it has faced during its corporate history.
In a recent interview with a renowned industry publication, Verifone’s CEO Rich Galant explained that the switch to the EMV chip card system is the best thing to happen to American retailers in years; however, the event that triggered the switch will always live in infamy.
The 2013 breach of the Target retail chain forced merchants and leaders of the payments industry to take a hard look at the national credit card processing infrastructure, which was seriously overdue for an overhaul. At the time the Target breach occurred, the legacy magnetic stripe system seemed to work well, at least on the surface; nonetheless, credit card fraud was rising to dangerous levels.
By forcing all retailers to switch to EMV, the payments industry has received a golden opportunity to reinvent their networks, systems and procedures so that merchants and shoppers can benefit alike. One of the first issues emerging from the switch is that shoppers noticed that register transactions took longer; this is an issue that is already being addressed by major payment networks such as Visa and MasterCard.
Even with the faster chip card system, American shoppers believe that more could be done to modernize payments. To this effect, Verifone is already looking towards a future of mobile payments that may not only do away with cash but also with credit card terminals; after all, cloud computing and the Internet of things are supposed to do away with bulky hardware.
