Visa has partnered up with IBM Watson to bring its mobile payment system to all of IBM’s IoT-connected devices as consumers become more comfortable with the technology, driving mcommerce further into a futuristic era.

The partnership offers a unique opportunities for retailers by making almost any connected device into a potential point of sale. Visa’s latest effort reaffirms its commitment to taking payments out of the traditional setting and into a new mobile world.

“IoT is literally changing the world around us, whether it’s allowing businesses to achieve unimaginable levels of efficiency or enabling a washing machine to ensure we never run out of detergent. And behind this transformation are companies like Visa and technologies like IBM’s Watson IoT platform,” said Harriet Green, general manager, IBM Watson IoT. “This combination of IBM’s industry leading IoT technologies with Visa payment services, signifies the next defining moment in commerce by allowing payments on any connected object, with new levels of simplicity and convenience for everyone.”

Global mobile payments
In the years since the introduction of proper mobile payments, the payment world has only continued to change and evolve.

Mobile payments have exploded the longstanding conception of how transactions can work, showing that they do not have to take place in the same settings, under the same rules they always have.

Instead, mobile payments have shown that payments can go anywhere. Already we see waiters swiping diners’ credit cards right at the table with a mobile device, or Amazon dash buttons that let consumers quickly purchase a vital product with nothing more than a single button press.

Visa has been at the forefront of the mobile payments movement, with over 3 billion people using its global payments system.

Now, the credit card provider is teaming up with IBM Watson for one of the most ambitious mobile payment initiatives yet.

IBM will be integrating Visa’s global payment services into all of its IoT-connected products, potentially opening up vast new opportunities for points of sale both at home and out in the world.

Payments everywhere
Both Visa and IBM have been pushing the boundaries of mobile payments, each in their own way.

Visa has been confidently expanding its payment services to a variety of other venues outside of the traditional retail store.

One of its most recent partnerships to that end was with Honda as the two experimented with in-car payments (see story).

Meanwhile, IBM Watson has been one of the biggest names in IoT, and that translates into payments as well.

The company provided the technology behind Staples’ recent redesign of the Easy Button into a shoppable piece of tech (see story).

Now that these two are coming together for a massive new payment initiative, it is clear that the future of mobile payments will be everywhere where consumers are connected.

“The Internet of Things is not only driving a more connected world, it’s changing the way we live, shop and pay, by moving data and the point-of-sale to wherever the consumer wants it to be,” said Jim McCarthy, executive vice president, innovation and strategic partnerships, Visa Inc. “With the power of Watson’s cognitive technologies and IBM’s leadership in IoT and security, they are the ideal partner to help us deliver secure payments to ‘virtually anywhere’ and on the enormous scale of the IoT.”