More than three months after announcing that it is working on the launch of its namesake digital wallet platform, LG has today finally taken the wraps of the same. Called LG Pay, the company has launched its payments service in its home country — South Korea.
The digital wallet is currently available on just one smartphone, LG’s latest flagship device — LG G6 and is expected to reach other devices in the coming weeks. For those owning the gorgeous G6 with the ‘Full Vision‘ display, you all will receive the LG Pay wallet service via an over-the-air (OTA) software update.
Unlike its homegrown counterpart Samsung, the Korean behemoth hasn’t based LG Pay on Magnetic Security Transmission (MST) technology. It has instead decided to adopt the Wireless Magnetic Communication (WMC) technology and launched with support for credit cards from four prominent Korean issuers — Shinhan, KB, BC, and Lotte. LG has further stated that the wallet service will support all major cards in South Korea by the end of September.
Using LG Pay is as simple as any other digital wallet platform, you’re just required to place your smartphone (or in some case, even the smartwatch) near a payment (POS) terminal, approve the transaction using your fingerprint or the one-time password that you can set up for your LG device. And voila, you’re done with the payment process.
LG Pay will now compete against digital wallet services launched by other leading technology giants such as Apple, Google, and Samsung. These companies have, however, been expanding on the feature set and reach of each of their individual Pay wallets to newer geographies. It had trademarked the LG Pay name way back in 2015 but decided only to launch the wallet now, when the rivalry for the top spot has become intense.
LG is late to the cashless party and will now need to aggressively dedicate itself to making consumers aware of its self-branded digital wallet services. There are already several major alternatives available in the market and LG seems to have added to this clutter — and it won’t even be inter-operable. At least, Samsung has decided to make its wallet services available on all phones with the launch of its Samsung Pay Mini Android app.
Img Source: Gizbot
