Privately held mobile payment company PayOne announced today that it has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against The Home Depot (HD -0.75%) for its use of eBay's (EBAY -0.02%) PayPal technology at its checkout.
In a statement today, PayOne President and CEO Joe Lynam said:
Since 2000, PayOne has invested significant time and money developing its proprietary mobile payment technologies designed to simplify the checkout process and the PayOne systems have been deployed by digital merchants across the globe. The 'mobile wallet wars' have moved beyond the digital world into point of sale, but now face adoption challenges and substantial friction with consumer setup requirements, security concerns and lack of merchant required NFC infrastructure. PayOne's technology solves these challenges by enabling an 'instant wallet' capability that can be extended to the retail and physical world for billions of consumers worldwide, with no pre-registration or friction at point of sale, and no NFC infrastructure required.
PayOne has accused Home Depot of infringing on two separate patents, including the use of a phone number and PIN to pay, as well as point-of-sale payment. The company is seeking a court-ordered injunction, as well as unspecified damages.
According to PayOne, there are almost 10 billion mobile-connected devices internationally, and the company's Global Carrier Network currently offers payment ability for over 4 billion across 80 countries .
As of this writing, neither The Home Depot, nor eBay have published any official responses to PayOne's suit.
