Google Challenges Apple in Tap-Pay Service
Google is teaming up with three major wireless carriers, making a major challenge to Apple Pay, the new mobile wallet system. In a deal with Verizon, AT&T and T-Mobile, Google's tap-and-pay service will be built into Android smartphones sold by those carriers. Smartphone owners now have to download Google Wallet and install the app on their phone if they want to use the service. Besides trying to make it more convenient to use Wallet, Google also is hoping to improve the nearly four-year-old service. The tech giant is buying some mobile payment technology and patents from Softcard, a venture owned by the wireless carriers.
Many drivers are in love with their smartphones, and they want the same technology in their cars. Auto manufacturers are listening. "Even the dealers are setting up tech-specific help centers for customers who want to learn more about what's in these cars," says Alexandra Mondalek of Bloomberg News in Detroit. "We're seeing that the average length auto lease has fallen to about 36 months: that's pretty close to the average trade-in rate for an iPhone or smartphone." But tech in cars goes beyond entertainment. "A lot of it is safety features like lane-keep assist, rear parking cameras, which will be ubiquitous in all models in the next five years," Mondalek says.
What will Janet Yellen say about interest rate policy ? Wall Street investors are listening carefully today to any hints in the Fed chair's remarks to the Senate Banking Committee. Stocks ended Monday mostly lower after disappointing home sales numbers. Little change for stock futures this morning.
A judge has ordered Republican New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and the state Legislature to put more money into pension funds for retired public workers. Unions for public workers sued Christie after he announced last year he would not make the full pension payments to which he had agreed in a 2011 overhaul. Pension shortfalls in a number of states are a growing concern.
Richard Davies, Business Correspondent, ABC News Radio, Twitter: daviesnow