Windows Phone Wallet could get a big boost with former Amazon Payments leader

Could a Windows Phone Wallet expansion be in the works now that Apple had introduced Apple Pay for iPhone users? While nothing has been announced by Microsoft, the company has poached rival Amazon's product leader of Payments in Iain Kennedy. Described as a 6-year veteran at Amazon, Kennedy had worked on the company's "local commerce efforts."

According to Re/Code, Kennedy had been leading efforts to build a local payment system for Amazon that sounds like Google Wallet, Apple Pay, and even Softcard. It's unclear if Kennedy will be putting his expertise to work to help expand Microsoft's Windows Phone Wallet, which could be potentially be a direct competitor to Apple Pay.

And according to a job listing that Amazon exec Charlie Kindel has been tweeting out, the group Kennedy was managing is also working on a secret "set of related, undisclosed, products which will delight billions of customers as they buy and sell things in the real world (as opposed to online)."

So far, neither Kennedy nor Microsoft is disclosing what his new role will be in Redmond.

Thanks, Laura, for the tip.

Source: Re/Code

Chuong Nguyen

Chuong's passion for gadgets began with the humble PDA. Since then, he has covered a range of consumer and enterprise devices, raning from smartphones to tablets, laptops to desktops and everything in between for publications like Pocketnow, Digital Trends, Wareable, Paste Magazine, and TechRadar in the past before joining the awesome team at Windows Central. Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, when not working, he likes exploring the diverse and eclectic food scene, taking short jaunts to wine country, soaking in the sun along California's coast, consuming news, and finding new hiking trails.