Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX) CEO Dekkers Davidson announced yesterday that he is officially seeking greener pastures, releasing a statement that says he will be “off to pursue other opportunities.” This comes on the heels of reports that consortium member Best Buy would be ditching MCX’s CurrentC mobile payment platform in favor of Apple Pay.
When the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus were released in the fall of 2014, they debuted with Apple Pay onboard, the so-called “killer feature” that experts believed would drive sales of the new flagships. However, there was a bit of furor among some retailers, who blocked Apple Pay and other NFC payment systems, due to their commitments to MCX and CurrentC; as part of its terms, MCX banned participating retailers from adopting other payment systems.
But with Apple Pay now past its first half-year, CurrentC has yet to be released to the public, and going back to the present, Best Buy has, according to reports, turned its back on MCX’s mobile payment platform. At the moment, competing retail giants Walmart and Target are still part of MCX, but the prospect of losing Best Buy appears to be a big blow, thus making Davidson’s departure as CEO not the least bit surprising. There may be other reasons, though, reasons that have yet to be confirmed as the story continues to develop.
In an official statement, Best Buy Director of External Communication told Mac Observer that the company remains committed to MCX. “We remain invested in MCX and remain part of MCX,” he said. “Our decision to accept Apple Pay immediately in our app and later this year in our stores does not mean that we have left MCX.” He added, however, that as Best Buy is still “continuing to evaluate MCX’s pilot tests,” it’s too soon to say whether it will or will not be adopting CurrentC when it finally gets released.