Visa Announces Support for Google Wallet

A new application and service is now available for the owners of a Nexus S 4G smartphone on Sprint's airwaves in the United States, namely Google Wallet, which offers them the possibility to replace their over-stuffed wallets with their mobile phone.

Announced with support for Citi and MasterCard in the beginning, the application has already received support from Visa, courtesy of an agreement that the company and Google have just announced.

Through this deal, Google scored a worldwide license to Visa payWave, an NFC-based payment technology that offers users the possibility to play at retail locations through waving their mobile phones in front of a payment terminal.

Hundreds of thousands of retail locations all around the world already offer support for this payment technology, Visa announced.

Through the new agreement, Visa account holders will be able to add their accounts to Google Wallet, regardless whether they are credit, debit or prepaid. Thus, their smartphones become their digital wallets.

“This agreement extends Google Wallet to Visa account holders worldwide," said Stephanie Tilenius, vice president of Commerce and Payments at Google.

“This is a crucial step towards realizing our shared vision for the future of mobile commerce – one that creates a rich shopping experience for consumers and merchants alike.”

The new deal also marks a step forward in Google's attempt to make the shopping experience of users a much simpler and pleasant activity by offering them the possibility to make mobile payments with the handset in their hands.

At the moment, Google Wallet offers support for payment cards, offers, loyalty and gift cards, but more will be added into the mix soon. Moreover, Google announced that it plans on delivering a new mobile shopping experience to users by partnering with top retail brands.

“Mobile technology is transforming how people pay for goods and services,” said Jim McCarthy, global head of product, Visa Inc.

“This agreement builds on Visa's strategy of enabling consumers to make mobile payments with whatever device they choose using the trusted accounts they already have.”