The way merchants accept payments is changing fast. Not long ago, taking a card payment always meant a dedicated terminal on the counter. Today, a smartphone or a smart POS device with an NFC antenna can accept a contactless card directly — no extra reader required.
If you follow the payments industry, you’ve probably seen terms like Tap to Pay, SoftPOS everywhere. Here’s what they actually mean, in plain language — and what they mean for our roadmap.
What is Tap to Pay?
Tap to Pay is the everyday name for accepting contactless payments. The customer taps a contactless card, phone, or watch on the merchant’s device, and the payment is done in about two seconds.
Under the hood, it is the same secure, encrypted EMV transaction you would get from a traditional countertop terminal — the only difference is what the merchant is holding. Apple calls its version Tap to Pay on iPhone; on Android it’s usually called Tap to Pay on Android.
What is SoftPOS?
SoftPOS stands for Software Point of Sale. The idea is simple: turn a regular commercial device — a smartphone, a tablet, or an Android smart POS — into a payment terminal using software instead of dedicated payment hardware.
A natural question is: a normal phone isn’t a tamper-proof safe, so how can it be secure? The answer is a security framework called PCI MPoC, which replaces the physical vault with a team of digital bodyguards:
- The app must prove to the cloud, before every transaction, that the device hasn’t been rooted or tampered with;
- Encryption keys are delivered from the cloud, rotated regularly, and never stored in plain form;
- Devices are monitored continuously — anything suspicious is remotely disabled.
The result: merchants can accept cards with hardware they already own, and new sellers can be onboarded with a download instead of a hardware shipment.
EMV L1, L2, L3 — three exams every payment device must pass
Any device that wants to accept bank cards legally has to pass three layers of certification. Think of them as three exams:
- EMV L1 is the physical exam.Can the device reliably “talk” to a card? It tests the NFC radio and electrical interface — pure hardware. Without it, cards simply won’t read.
- EMV L2 is the rules exam.Does the software inside (the “kernel”) follow each card scheme’s rules — Visa, Mastercard, UnionPay each have their own test?
- EMV L3 is the road test.Does the complete device work end-to-end with a real acquiring bank, including declines, refunds, timeouts, and reversals?
For a hardware manufacturer like us, L1 is the foundation — and it’s our job to get it right, so our partners can build everything else on top with confidence.
Why this matters now
Contactless is no longer a feature — it’s the default. Card networks report that contactless already accounts for the clear majority of in-person transactions in many markets, and SoftPOS adoption is growing at triple-digit rates year over year. For software vendors and distributors, the winners will be the platforms that can offer both: rock-solid certified hardware and the flexibility of software-based acceptance.
What we're doing about it
We are moving in this direction — and we want our partners to be the first to know.
We are developing a new generation of Android-based POS devices with integrated NFC, designed to meet EMV Contactless L1 certification. They will provide the certified hardware foundation for Tap to Pay and SoftPOS solutions — ready to pair with certified payment kernels and SoftPOS software from industry-leading partners.
In other words: you bring the software and the vision; we’ll bring hardware that’s certified, modular, and built for where payments are going.
Interested in our upcoming Android lineup? [Contact us] — we’d love to talk.
