• by Gavin O'Malley , Staff Writer @mp_gavin, November 8, 2011

Following a number of related efforts, American Express just launched a $100 million fund to invest in start-ups and companies in the digital commerce space.

“The digital commerce initiative will make investments in a number of areas involving the digital commerce experience, including loyalty and rewards, mobile and online payment management, fee-based services, security and fraud detection and data analysis,” TechCrunch reports.

“Amex has already been investing in digital commerce, with companies such as Rearden Commerce and Payfone,” Forbes notes. “The new strategic investment program will help Amex stay close to emerging technology in these different areas.”

Under the headline, “Amex throws $100M at its biggest problem: suiting up for the digital revolution,” a less forgiving VentureBeat writes: “If we didn’t know better, we’d say American Express was employing the tried-and-true ‘spray and pray tactic’, aiming its vast resources at every buzz-laden startup and platform it can see on the technological scene and praying that one of its bets will shape up to be a real winner in the mass market.”

Put another way, GigaOm writes: “American Express wants to have a stake in the next big digital commerce start-up and it’s establishing a new $100 million fund to make sure it doesn’t miss out.”

Execution aside, “American Express knows that times are a-changin’ and consumers are moving away from plastic towards easier digital payments solutions,” VatorNews points out.

Start-ups, meanwhile, can expect access to Amex’s payment network, merchants and consumers, global reach, data analytics and experience in payments.

In an interview with AllThingsD, American Express Enterprise Growth President Dan Schulman said the goal is to acquire a minority stake in the companies and form a strategic partnership with them, so that they can take advantage of American Express’s 94 million customers.