I work for a company in this space, and we are in the same boat (major credit card compan[y/ies] investors & on the board). And there is a lot of "we're sticking it to the credit card companies" talk here, which I find hilarious. We pose exactly 0 threat to the credit card industry. If we work out and do extraordinarily well--guess who makes a bunch of money? Credit card companies! If we go bust, we haven't hurt them in the least.
It's funny how we trash-talk the credit cards. Credit card companies are going NOWHERE. If they ditch their plastic cards, that's one thing, but extending credit to people will be a business for a very, very long time. All of the mobile-payments companies (mine included) that I am aware of are still supporting credit cards--they may do fancy footwork to lower their own effective rates, and give some of that savings to their customers, but ultimately, credit card companies are still getting their cut.
It's funny how we trash-talk the credit cards. Credit card companies are going NOWHERE. If they ditch their plastic cards, that's one thing, but extending credit to people will be a business for a very, very long time. All of the mobile-payments companies (mine included) that I am aware of are still supporting credit cards--they may do fancy footwork to lower their own effective rates, and give some of that savings to their customers, but ultimately, credit card companies are still getting their cut.