VeriFone Acquires Company That Helps Retailers Swap Registers for iPads

VeriFone, the largest maker of cash registers and other payment processing devices, has acquired Global Bay, which develops software that helps retailers use alternate devices, such as iPads, as payment options.

I recently wrote about how Global Bay was assisting Pacific Sunwear in rolling out iPads to 600-plus stores over the next year.

At the time, Global Bay’s CEO Sandeep Bhanote called it “an Apple world in retail” and said that virtually no retailers were currently “looking at Android, or at the older generation of devices.”

Of course, VeriFone is the incumbent provider that has prospered greatly based on those older devices, but it’s now exploring new digital options.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Bhanote has been appointed general manager of VeriFone’s Mobile Retail Systems business.

In a release, VeriFone said the acquisition is part of the company’s strategy to leverage mobile devices more going forward, including smartphones and tablets.

While this likely represents a fairly small acquisition, VeriFone has said it may acquire one company a year at roughly $500 million to $700 million apiece, along with several smaller transactions. In all, its purchases could add up to as much as $1 billion annually.

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Just as the atom bomb was the weapon that was supposed to render war obsolete, the Internet seems like capitalism’s ultimate feat of self-destructive genius, an economic doomsday device rendering it impossible for anyone to ever make a profit off anything again. It’s especially hopeless for those whose work is easily digitized and accessed free of charge.

— Author Tim Kreider on not getting paid for one’s work