The Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, commonly referred to as CIBC, has removed its mobile payment app from the Goodle Play Store in a daring move which is due to the popularity of third-party mobile wallets like Samsung Pay and Apple Pay. The bank which is one of the Big Five banks in Canada is defying the recent banking trend by pulling its own app from Google Play Store. The CIBC mobile payment app is the only one affected, as the CIBC Mobile Banking app which allows users to make bill payments, transfer money and more, is still available.
CIBC has been a leader in the mobile payments industry in Canada. The mobile payment app was developed in 2012 and was the first-ever credit card payment system for smartphone devices that used a secure SIM card within any NFC-enabled devices. On the other hand, Samsung Pay made its debut in Canada in November last year with CIBC being the first partner bank that supported the mobile payment platform and the payment platform proved to be a popular one. According to Canadian tech blog Mobile Syrup, a spokesperson for the bank hinted that the recent launch of Apple Pay and Samsung Pay had generated a strong, positive client response. The bank hinged the decision to stop supporting the CIBC mobile payment app on the response as well as on client feedback on future mobile payments options. The bank spokesperson further hinted that the bank will instead shift its focus on growing mobile payments in other areas.
Apparently, CIBC hopes to establish a solid foundation for its partnership with Samsung as it is the first bank to roll out this service in Canada. When it was launched, interested users needed to sign up for a CIBC Visa credit card, have one of Samsung’s latest devices (Galaxy S6, S6 edge, S6 edge+, Note 5, S7 and S7 edge) and download the app in order to access the Samsung Pay services. Samsung and CIBC added support for Loyalty and Membership cards in early 2017 so users could save their cards directly in Samsung Pay.
There is presently no indication as to when Samsung Pay will support credit and debit cards from other Canadian banks. But would CIBC want to wait for other banks to join the party before consolidating on its lead? We’re not sure about that. Besides, the top five big Canadian banks all have support for Apple Pay already.
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