Visa has signed its third mobile payments partnership in four months. Yesterday, the payments company announced the formation of a global alliance with Samsung to develop mobile payment products.Visa's move follows an announcement by MasterCard this week that its digital wallet, MasterPass, will be ready to sign up customers next month.In November PayPal announced that the restaurant chain Guzman Y Gomez, fashion retailer Glue Store, bakery chain Sonoma and education retailer Crayon were trialling PayPal Here, which facilitates payments through a mobile app. In the latest news, Samsung has agreed to load the Visa payWave application on to its mobile devices featuring near field communication technology. This will allow consumers to make contactless payments using a mobile device.In November, Visa announced a partnership with Vodafone to develop a mobile payment application called Vodafone SmartPass. The system will use Visa's payWave technology combined with NFC.A Visa re-loadable card will be stored on an NFC-enabled SIM card and operated through an application.In December, Visa, Optus and Heritage Bank announced the trial of a smartphone contactless payment product. Optus is aiming to use the trial as a stepping-stone to the launch of an m-wallet.The Samsung deal will allow financial institutions offering mobile payments to use Visa's mobile provisioning service, a secure service for downloading payment information.A Visa Australia spokeswoman, Judy Shaw, said developments under the Samsung alliance would be available in Australia as they were rolled out around the world.MasterCard is working with a number of financial institutions and retailers on MasterPass, including National Australia Bank, Commonwealth Bank and Westpac, Harvey Norman, JB Hi-Fi and Roses Only.These new payment systems rely on consumers being prepared to make contactless payments. The evidence is that Australian consumers have adopted contactless in large numbers.The head of payments at Coles, Doug Swansson, told delegates at a CeBIT conference last year that 40 per cent of Coles MasterCard transactions were contactless. "Acceptance is strong," he said. <!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:"ＭＳ 明朝"; mso-font-charset:78; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:-536870145 1791491579 18 0 131231 0;} @font-face {font-family:"ＭＳ 明朝"; mso-font-charset:78; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:-536870145 1791491579 18 0 131231 0;} @font-face {font-family:Cambria; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:-536870145 1073743103 0 0 415 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-unhide:no; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; margin:0cm; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"ＭＳ 明朝"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language:EN-US;} .MsoChpDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; mso-default-props:yes; font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"ＭＳ 明朝"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi; mso-ansi-language:EN-US;} @page WordSection1 {size:612.0pt 792.0pt; margin:72.0pt 90.0pt 72.0pt 90.0pt; mso-header-margin:36.0pt; mso-footer-margin:36.0pt; mso-paper-source:0;} div.WordSection1 {page:WordSection1;} --