Best Buy’s Acceptance Of Apple Pay Is A Gut Punch For MCX And CurrentC
There were many interesting tidbits to come out of Apple's Q2 financial call yesterday, all of which Brandon highlighted. There's one tidbit that might be flying under some people's radar, but deserves some more attention: Apple announced a major win with its Apple Pay service, as it can now count Best Buy as a supporter.
This isn't just big news because Best Buy is a major retailer; it becomes massive news because Best Buy is part of the consortium of retailers that's working on its own Apple Pay competitor, called CurrentC. A Best Buy spokeswoman says that her company remains committed to the consortium, called MCX, but said it wouldn't commit to using CurrentC at launch.
Best Buy's move doesn't necessarily mean that Apple Pay has "killed" CurrentC, because nothing stops a retailer from supporting both. And doing so would be kind of important, since Apple Pay supports only Apple products. It'd be quite a bold move to leave users of other platforms in the dark.
The fact that Best Buy can't even commit to rolling out a solution at launch that the consortium it supports will be releasing is interesting. But here's a hint to things: Re/code notes that Best Buy's membership with MCX is set to expire this summer. It could be that Best Buy is simply being held back too much by being part of this group, which wouldn't be a surprise, as both CVS and Rite Aid - other MCX members - got rid of Apple Pay support not long after rolling it out.
This will be an interesting story to see play out.
