Weve Set to Abandon Mobile Wallet Offering

weve logoOver a year ago, a piece on this site asked Where’s the Weve mobile wallet?. When the joint venture between operators EE, O2 and Vodafone was originally announced, it looked like a potential breakthrough for mobile payments in the UK, but as the months went by, there was no further word about the launch.

At the time, then-marketing director Tony Moretta (who left the company in January) told Mobile Marketing the wallet would launch in the second half of 2014. In February, then-CEO David Sear (who also left Weve, in August) pointed to a 2015 launch date.

Now, it seems that Weve may have abandoned the mobile wallet altogether. According to a Telegraph report, the involved operators have been unable to agree on how exactly a unified app should work, opting instead for individual apps.

Weves spokesperson wasnt able to confirm or deny these reports, instead sharing a statement which read: “Weve has also done a great deal of valuable work exploring opportunities in the UK mobile payments space in 2014, yielding insight and developing significant IP in this market.

“We continue to believe there is a great deal of potential in mobile contactless payments and we are currently working on developments where Weve can help streamline the mobile payments process.”

The timing here is especially interesting, following as it does last weeks potentially game-changing announcement of the Apple Pay mobile payments service. Weve long held that Apples unwillingness to integrate NFC into its devices could be the biggest obstacle to the development of mobile wallet offerings like Weves – but now it appears that the opposite may in fact be true.