SAN FRANCISCO — Stripe, which helps businesses process payments online, has entered into an agreement to acquire Hong Kong-based BBPOS, one of Stripe’s earliest and closest Terminal manufacturing partners.
Last year alone, BBPOS and Stripe collaborated on three new card readers, including the first Stripe-designed piece of hardware, Stripe Reader. By bringing hardware development in-house, Stripe plans to accelerate the pace of innovation for its card readers. Terms of the acquisition weren’t released.
John Affaki, Terminal Business Lead at Stripe, said, “With Terminal, we offer simple, seamlessly integrated payment solutions to our global users. Bringing BBPOS’s hardware capabilities in-house means we will soon be able to innovate even faster.”
Existing BBPOS customers can continue to use the company’s products directly.
Stripe also reported that Stripe Terminal, its in-person payments solution for Internet businesses, has seen payment volumes increase over six times in the past year.
Internet first retailers including Buck Mason, Castlery, Glossier, and Warby Parker are using Stripe to power transactions across both brick-and-mortar and online storefronts in a single unified tech stack. Using Terminal with Stripe Connect, platforms like Lightspeed, Mindbody, Shopify, and Wix provide their business users with the capability to accept in-person payments.
“With Stripe Terminal, businesses on Mindbody can use the same payment system for both online and in-person transactions, simplifying the experience for both wellness staff and customers,” said Emily Bartels, Vice President, Payments, Mindbody. “Now with Terminal available in the UK, more businesses using Mindbody can meet customers where they are, either online or in-person, with a cohesive way to pay for appointments and classes.”
Last year, Stripe Terminal expanded to 9 additional countries across 4 continents. Having launched in the United States in 2018, Terminal is now available for businesses operating in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Singapore, the UK, and the US.
With Terminal’s flexible developer tools, pre-certified card readers, and cloud-based hardware management, users like Lightspeed, Mindbody, Shopify, and Wix can now easily satisfy the demand from their global customers looking to offer omnichannel experiences.
“Despite the pandemic-fueled surge in online shopping, in-person sales remain important to many businesses’ bottom line. In the past year alone, Terminal payment volume has increased sixfold. As consumers return to in-person shopping, businesses around the world are now able to seamlessly accept both online and offline payments in a single system,” said John Affaki, Terminal Business Lead at Stripe.
