Report: Wal-Mart, Target to develop mobile payment network

New York -- A Wednesday report by the Wall Street Journal said that big retailers such as Wal-Mart Stores, Target Corp. and 7-Eleven are planning to develop a mobile payment network much like the Starbucks Square initiative that was announced last week.



Citing unnamed sources, WSJ said the merchants are working to develop a Merchant Customer Exchange initiative to match similar services from Google. This type of technology allows customers to download applications to their smartphones that enable the devices to pay for purchases by tapping their phones against a reader in stores.