Market research firm yStats has released a new report concerning the mobile commerce sector in Europe. The report, called "Europe M-Commerce Snapshot 2014," suggests that more consumers are becoming interested in the idea of shopping online and purchasing products from their mobile devices. Mobile shopping is praised among consumers for its convenient nature as it can take place anywhere and at any time. Mobile shopping is particularly popular among commuters that have limited time to visit physical stores. The report notes that mobile commerce is particularly popular in Western Europe, where there is a high level of smartphone and tablet …

The next generation of mobile innovation for online travel agencies is moving away from transactions to influencing all parts of the travel experience, including loyalty programs, personalized messages and real-world sales. Mobile Marketer looked at the mobile offerings from five online travel brands: Expedia, Travelocity, Kayak, Orbitz and Priceline. Although streamlining the mobile commerce experience is still a big priority for many, brands are also looking at how to leverage other mediums to gain market share. "We're actively thinking about ways to use mobile devices in the future of hotel travel," said John Caine, chief product officer at Priceline, Norwalk, …

While the industry waits for Amazon to flex its payments muscles with the 215 million credit cards they have on file, they are joined by the ultimate Amazon insider, CEO Jeff Bezos. "Jeff's told us it's something we need to be successful in, and should be successful in," Amazon Payments boss Tom Taylor told ReCode in an interview . "The pressure I feel from Jeff is, 'Go faster,'" he added. Last fall Amazon launched Login and Pay with Amazon, though mass adoption of the service has been slow, mostly due to the fact that many retailers that compete with Amazon …

We have seen this movie before. KGI Securities analyst Ming Chi-Kuo has made predictions in the past and many of them have gone right. He has a good reputation given so many others go wrong. But he may or may not be right all the time. This time he says iWatch and iPhone 6 will have NFC. We always like to do some facts finding before doing any kind of crystal ball gazing. So here we are with our research on patents that Apple has got in the recent past. April 2010: Patent citing "iTravel" app. The iTravel app would …

Amazon has just launched its latest mobile gadget in the form of the Dash, a handheld device that is meant to make it a great deal easier for consumers to be able to add items to their shopping lists. According to the website, Every member of the family can use Dash to easily add items to your AmazonFresh shopping list." The mobile gadget simply needs to be directed at the barcode on an item in the kitchen that is running low - perhaps the bottle of ketchup, the jar of peanut butter, or a box of cereal, for example - …

Subway has enlarged its mobile ordering areas with the start of app pilot program at its Manhattan stores, Mobile Commerce Daily reports. The mobile ordering app, first debuting at certain California locations, allows customers to send orders to a specific store via their smartphones. "The world is becoming more and more efficient, and with the launch of the Subway mobile app it will enable the customer to order on their mobile device and have it ready for pick up avoiding or lessening their wait time," said Mike Cochrane, sales director at Atimi Software who is an expert on mobile apps. …

Google continues to move away from near-field-communication with a bigger bet on a cloud-based system that makes mobile payments accessible to more marketers even though retailers are still skeptical on the Internet giant's intentions. Ariel Bardi, head of payments at Google, Mountain View, CA, discussed how the manufacturer plans to stay ahead in mobile payments earlier this week during a presentation at the Electronic Transactions Association's Transact 2014 show. Google Wallet originally made a big bet on near-field-communications when it launched in 2011, but will now leverage host car emulation - or HCE - to store credit card credentials versus …

When it comes to which social media platforms to bet on, Urban Outfitters thinks outside the box with a new application update that heavily plays up the retailer's growing fan base on Wanelo. According to Wanelo, Urban Outfitters has built up a following on the social site that amasses some of the bigger social sites. The brand has a following of 2,435,965 on Wanelo, 134,632 on Pinterest and 1,300,245 on Instagram. Urban Outfitters has updated its iPhone app with two new features that reflect this shift towards favoring engagement versus sales in mobile.

The top 10 percent of affluent consumers have adopted a sense of invulnerability following the 2008 recession that has affected how they approach the purchase of luxury goods and services, according to a new survey conducted by YouGov. Presented to attendees of the Luxury Summit in Naples, FL, April 8, the "2014 Survey of Affluence and Wealth" found that although luxury goods and services have seen sales growth, marketers have encountered troubles when targeting a more confident consumer. In the wake of the Great Recession, the affluent have become more secure and confident in their "shopping prowess" to ensure they …

As eBay shares its vision of being a partner to retailers and helping them become "omnichannel" - a reference to serving customers online, offline and mobile - its payments unit is looking to do the same. PayPal is expanding its Partner Program to be more compelling to additional types of providers and is set to launch the new program this summer. Among the vendors and developers PayPal wishes to work with are POS solution providers, processing resellers, system integrators, associations, and peripheral partners. PayPal said it wants to collaborate with "payment industry innovators" on all kinds of solutions whether they …