Samsung Pay Might Make Its Way To Non-Samsung Flagship Smarthones

A new report claims that Samsung’s mobile payment service might be heading to non-Samsung smartphones. The possibility of this happening could give Samsung Pay the boost that it needs to get ahead of Apple Pay.

Samsung is already planning to bring Samsung Pay to its mid-range devices, which could setup a precedent that would bring the service to more Samsung phones in the future. However, according to Gadget 360’s sources, Samsung is also planning to take its payment service beyond its own Galaxy-branded phones.

Samsung is said to be currently in talks with OEMs, so that it could bring Samsung Pay to high-end smartphones from other companies. No particular brands or company names were given, but the keywords here are “high-end smartphones.” Samsung Pay might simply be made available to flagship devices from the likes of LG, HTC, Google and others.

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In theory, Samsung Pay’s NFC (Near-Field Communications) capabilities could work on other flagships if they have the sensor, but the service also requires MST (Magnetic Secure Transmission) technology in order to fully function. NFC allows two devices to communicate with each other, while MST emulates the swiping of a real-life credit card on a payment terminal.

All of Samsung’s Galaxy-branded phones that support Samsung Pay come with a special component dedicated to the MST technology. The problem here is how can Samsung Pay work on non-Samsung phones that don’t support MST. MST isn’t required for Apple Pay and Android Pay, both of which only rely on NFC.

Samsung could provide manufacturers with a specialized chipset in order for their handsets to support MST. A source said that the South Korean phone maker has already held initial talks with manufacturers regarding this option.

Another thing that the company is considering is creating and selling a standalone accessory the solves the MST issue. This accessory could be similar to the LoopPlay Card. This strategy is said to be in Samsung’s best interest and is feasible in bringing full Samsung Pay support to other Android smartphones.

It’s also been said that either or both options could end up being finalized. Samsung is said to be planning to introduce these options to the market some time in mid-2018. Unfortunately, none of these have been confirmed by Samsung thus far.

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Samsung Pay was first released back in 2015, and at the time only the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy Note 5 were compatible with the service. It was preceded by Apple Pay and Google’s Android Pay, but it slowly gained a lot of users. Juniper Research reported back in April that Samsung pay already had 34 million users, while Android Pay had 24 million and Apple Pay had 86 million.

If Samsung does move forward with its plan to bring Samsung Pay to other Android devices, it might be enough to eventually overtake Apple Pay in the near future. Even if Samsung doesn’t do this elaborate expansion, it’s already expanding the service to other countries. Most recently, Samsung Pay was made available in India through the Galaxy J7 Pro and J7 Max.