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If you've ever been to a store, you know the drill: Browse themerchandise, pick something, carry it to the checkout counter,maybe wait in line, pay, then walk out with your purchases and areceipt. Whether it's a clothing store, a grocery store or a coffee shop,you're likely to find a big counter with a cash register on it, anda person operating that cash register on the other side. You go tothem; they don't come to you. Why? An American saloon owner named James Ritty invented the cashregister in 1879. Since then, all cash registers have shared thecharacteristics of bigness, heaviness and bulkiness -- and haverequired the old walk-up-to-the-counter behavior in order to buythings. One notable exception is your local Apple Store. There are no cashregisters. If you want to buy something, you flag down some kidwearing a brightly colored T-shirt and hand over your credit card.The kid scans the item's bar code with a specially outfitted iPhone or iPad , swipes your credit card and emails you the receipt. Thetransaction can happen anywhere in the store. Apple , apparently, thinks the whole process for buying things in retailstores is dumb. The big counter you have to walk up to? The giantmachine for registering the transaction? The paper receipt? Dumb.Dumb. Dumb. And it has a point. Cash registers are obsolete and unnecessary. So why would Apple 's hotly anticipated iWallet system require a cash register? It won't, if one analyst has it right. More on that below. The new world of contactless payments When people talk about the future of digital wallets -- electronicsmartphone-based replacements for credit cards, debit cards andcash -- you're likely to hear the initials NFC in the same breath. NFC, for "near-field communication," is a setof technologies that makes it possible to pay for purchases usingsmartphones, among other things. The idea is that all smartphones will contain special NFC chipsthat enable you to use your phone as a credit card. To make atransaction, you pass your phone over or near a special gadgetthat's hooked up to a cash register as an equivalent to swiping acredit card. Many Android devices and other phones already have NFC chips. A few retailstores use NFC equipment. (As I write this, I'm sitting in a shopthat's part of the Peet's Coffee & Tea chain. There's an NFCdevice near the register at the checkout counter, and there's alittle sign specifying Google Wallet -based payments.) Everybody's been waiting for the other 900-lb. handset gorilla --Apple -- to ship iPhones with NFC chips in them to kick-start the contactless-paymentrevolution. How Apple will kill the cash register The point-of-sale industry (made up of companies that make and sellcash registers and the software and networked systems that supportthem) is in crisis. Apple's iPad is growing as an alternative to big, heavy cash registers andtheir hard-to-learn systems and interfaces. Small retail businesses are opening their doors without ever buyinga cash register. Instead, they're using iPads that use Square technology, or something similar, to handle the main functions ofcash registers -- at a fraction of the cost. Yet iPad-based point-of-sale systems don't involve digital wallets.The payment medium is still an old-and-busted credit card. Apple's iWallet digital wallet will eliminate the need for both thecash register and the credit card. Why? Because it will useBluetooth, rather than NFC, according to Pablo Saez Gil, a retail industry analyst withResearchFarm . Apple's solution is already deployed I told you back in March what I thought the new iPad's best featurewas: Bluetooth 4.0. Apple, which is notorious for being slow to market with brand-newtechnologies, was conspicuously early when it came to Bluetooth4.0. At the time they shipped, the iPhone 4S and the iPad were theonly major phone and tablet models to support Bluetooth 4.0. Why so aggressive with Bluetooth 4.0, Apple? Gil's answer: Bluetooth 4.0 is Apple's answer to the digital wallet and an alternative to NFC. For starters, Bluetooth can go into ultra-low-energy mode,passively making connections and transferring the informationnecessary to conduct a financial transaction. And it can make thoseconnections at much greater distances than NFC can -- up to 160feet -- eliminating the need for a customer to go to a checkoutcounter to use an NFC reader. Everyone has been waiting for Apple to announce the beginnings of adigital wallet system, followed by years of development, rolloutand evolutionary acceptance. But the Bluetooth 4.0 theory means that Apple could announceiWallet software -- an app, backed by a new service from Apple --and the program would come into being overnight. No doubt payment would happen through iTunes accounts as detailedin Apple's iWallet patent , and Apple would receive a micropayment with every transaction. Apple has built Bluetooth 4.0 into every computer, tablet and phoneit has shipped since the middle of 2011, representing millions ofusers. The world does not have to wait for a gradual NFC rollout.The underlying wireless technology has already been deployed atscale. Note that Apple has not announced a Bluetooth 4.0 digital walletsystem. But after considering Gil's analysis, I believe that theintroduction of such a system would explain why Apple rolled outBluetooth 4.0 so aggressively. It would also be in line withApple's obvious contempt for cash registers, and it would greatlyenhance Apple's effort to take over retail point-of-sale systemswith the iPad. Bluetooth 4.0 would enable retail stores to roll out instantiWallet point-of-sale systems that use iPads or Apple desktops orlaptops. These systems would eliminate the need for iPhone ownersto go to a checkout counter or use a credit card. Stores using cash registers and Google Wallet could also cheaply and easily offer Bluetooth 4.0 iWalletsolutions as well. That would give iPhone users the retailequivalent of the airlines' "business class" status; unlike usersof credit cards or Google Wallet, they wouldn't have to wait inline or even go anywhere near a checkout counter to pay for theirpurchases. In restaurants, credit card transactions would continue to requireservers to make two trips between the table and the cash register-- one to carry the card to the register for approval, and theother to punch in the tip and file the signed credit card slip. For its part, Google Wallet would require just one trip -- for thewaiter to bring an NFC device to the table. But Apple iWallet users wouldn't need the server at all: They'djust pay on the phone and go. If Bluetooth 4.0 makes it possible for Apple to simplify restaurantand retail payments to that extent, users would have an incentiveto switch to iPhones, restaurateurs and store owners would beinclined to switch to iPads, and financial services companies,including credit card companies, would be willing to play ball withApple. It would also give Google an incentive to embrace Bluetooth 4.0payments as well. Apple would be crazy not do to it. If a Bluetooth 4.0-based Apple iWallet is a success, it could bethe beginning of the end for the venerable cash register. Mike Elgan writes about technology and tech culture. You can contact Mike andlearn more about him at Elgan.com , or subscribe to his free email newsletter, Mike's List . You can also see more articles by Mike Elgan on Computerworld.com . Read more about mobile apps and services in Computerworld's Mobile Apps and Services Topic Center. The e-commerce company in China offers quality products such as China Wireline Drill Rod , China Drilling Mud Pumps, and more. For more , please visit Horizontal Directional Drilling Machine today!
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