Google Welcomes Apple Pay Launch in Canada If It Boosts Mobile Commerce

Google Canada’s managing director, Sam Sebastian, says the search giant would welcome the launch of Apple Pay here if it helped increase mobile commerce, speaking to The Canadian Press:

“I think anyone doing great new things in the market is great for everyone,” he says.

“If it makes it better for users and it gives folks more choice and more opportunities and better utility it’s good for Google, it’s good for anyone.”

The managing director doesn’t believe mobile payments will be a huge trend in Canada in 2015, because “It’s not, frankly, that hard to pull out a credit card and pay for something.” Sebastian believes something better needs to be created to “delight” consumers, but that something has yet to be discovered.

The interview was part of Google Canada explaining how it planned to boost and improve mobile advertising in 2015. Sebastian said “Once we figure (mobile advertising) out … it will probably be a much more powerful advertising medium than desktop or anything we’ve ever seen before.”

Steven Woods, engineering director for Google Canada, said their mobile ad push next year aims to be better, as it is aware some consumers scoff at the idea of location-based ads. Woods noted “The idea of what’s creepy and what’s appropriate is a constantly evolving thing,” so Google plans to continue to solve the complicated balance of showing mobile ads at the right time for users.

There’s no word on when Apple Pay will launch in Canada, but many suspect it’ll happen in 2015, part of an international expansion of the mobile payment system which is currently limited to the USA. TD Bank’s U.S. subsidiary launched support for Apple Pay earlier this month.