Mobile Point of Sale Vendors to Ship Over 54 Million Units by 2019

451 Research has released a new report that forecasts the global Mobile Point of Sale (mPOS) installed base to reach over 54 million units by 2019.

"Today, it's simply myopic to look at mPOS as a tool for micro-merchants. In a short time frame, it has broadened its roots across a wide swath of vertical industries and almost unanimously across all merchant tiers," said Jordan McKee, Senior Analyst for 451 Research's mobile payment coverage. "The technology's momentum is at least in part linked to its diversity; mPOS is helping to enable customer engagement in retailers such as Nordstrom while driving financial inclusion in countries such as Nigeria."

The number of mPOS systems such as those from Square is expected to grow from 13.3 million units to 54.03 units by 2019 with a compound annual growth rate of 32 percent. 451 Research based its forecasts on input from more than 75 vendor shipping estimates as well as direct vendor input.

It’s not hard to see why mPOS systems will become more popular. They give smaller retailers the ability to process credit and debit cards without a bulky and expensive cash register. mPOS could follow the trend of the developing world catching onto mobile technologies first. Mobile devices have been the most popular way to access the Internet, first on the older feature phones and later smartphones. It’s not just smaller retailers that will get in on the action.

The technology looks like it will be a boon to the delivery industry. Pizza companies can process payments more easily with a smartphone or tablet fitted with a card reader than handling paper forms. There will also be less of a chance that a delivery worker or customer could engage in fraud, as the banks could use their increasingly sophisticated fraud detection algorithms immediately.

This, combined with the mobility in such platforms, could make traditional PoS systems go the way of the land line.