NFC TIMES Exclusive Insight –Apple Pay, which launched its mobile payments service five years ago this week in the U.S., has so far failed to live up to expectations with the service, either in the U.S. or globally, in terms of users and transactions.
But that doesn’t mean that Apple Pay isn’t growing, and today at least one research firm, U.S.-based eMarketer, believes Apple is making significant progress, although the methodology for its projections are not clear. The market research firm released estimates and projections that it contends makes Apple Pay the most “popular” mobile payments app in the U.S. in terms of users, surpassing the Starbucks mobile app.
The firm actually estimates that Apple overtook Starbucks last year, with 27.7 million users, contradicting figures it released last year. Now eMarketer projects Apple Pay will have 30.3 million users in the U.S. by the end of 2019, or 47.3% of proximity mobile payment users. It forecasts that the Starbucks app will have 25.2 million users by the end of this year, or just under 40% of proximity mobile payment users.
