Ingenico bought Phos to turn phones into payment terminals

Ingenico is one of the largest providers of payments hardware; Phos is a software startup that turns smartphones into payment terminals

Phos raised about $8M over its lifetime; the acquisition price was not disclosed

Apollo carved Ingenico out of Worldline and took it private in October 2022 for an estimated $2.3 billion, with a stated strategy of moving increasingly toward software over hardware.

On 28 March 2023 Ingenico announced the Phos acquisition, an exit for Phos shareholders New Vision 3 and the venture arm of CM.com. Phos CEO Brad Hyett confirmed the startup's funding history and said the unit, then 34 employees, was expected to double in size and would not be profitable for two years because the tech is still nascent. Phos's customers were all on Android devices, but Hyett hinted at iOS work that could let Ingenico build on Apple's new phone-as-terminal capability and embed payments acceptance directly into third-party apps.

Apple entering phone-as-terminal made software acceptance a survival question for hardware makers.

Buying Phos was cheaper and faster than rebuilding an Android-first acceptance stack in-house.

Hyett plans to double the 34-person team and forgo profit for two years — the tech is still nascent.

An iOS build on Apple's tech could embed Ingenico payments inside third-party apps, beyond its classic terminals.

When a platform giant legitimates a threat — Apple turning phones into terminals — incumbents respond fastest by buying the startup already building the alternative.

As of the 28 March 2023 announcement, Ingenico planned to double Phos's team, keep the unit unprofitable for two years, and pursue iOS work on top of Apple's phone-as-terminal capability. No integration results were reported.