Ripple CEO Says Apple Pay and Banks Use Outdated ‘Horse and Buggy’ Technology
Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse says banks and payment platforms like Apple Pay are relying on crusty, outdated systems that are long overdue for replacement.
At this week’s Money20/20 Europe expo, the head of Ripple talked with the co-founder of 11:FS, Simon Taylor, about the increasing role of blockchain in the digital payments industry.
Garlinghouse outlined the distinction between Ripple’s products and the status quo, pointing to Apple Pay as a company that’s adding a slick new interface on top of old-fashioned infrastructure.
“Everything that happens below these services – down the stack – hasn’t changed. Ripple’s point of view is that to truly unlock innovation in the payments ecosystem, you have to start way down at the bottom. If you can reset the rail – the base layer – you can really unlock innovation…
Our customers are asking themselves: ‘If I want to be competitive for the next 10 years – for the next 50 – do I want to be dependent on what is effectively a horse and buggy system in a world of Teslas?'”
Ripple’s CEO has made a number of headlines recently.
Yesterday, Garlinghouse revealed that he expects dozens of banks will use its XRP-powered xRapid technology next year. He also affirmed Bitcoin’s utility as a store of value, but called BTC a slow and expensive means of exchange, saying the granddaddy of cryptocurrency won’t have as wide-ranging an impact as people once thought.
