We all know the scenario: you just had a great dinner with friends and family, your plate and glass are empty and you’re ready to leave. Problem is, the server hasn’t brought the bill yet. When they do, they disappear while you’re looking at it only to return what seems like an eternity later, take your card and vanish yet again. Some 15 minutes later, the transaction is completed and you can finally leave. Frustrating, especially if you were in a hurry.
Desmond Griffin, founder and CEO of Glance Technologies Inc. (CSE:GET) (OTCQB:GLNNF) and a man with a knack for taking everyday problems and creating solutions, made it his mission to make the bill-paying process at restaurants more efficient. His solution: Glance Pay, a mobile payment application catering to restaurants that employs the power of the smartphone rather than POS systems to pay your bar or restaurant bill.
This isn’t Griffin’s first go-round with an entrepreneurial idea for a common nuisance. Aggravated by hassles related to parking meters, he previously started a mobile payment company called PayByPhone and developed a flagship app for paying for parking with smartphones. PayByPhone subsequently was acquired for $45 million by a U.K. company in 2012 and then bought in December 2016 by Volkswagen Financial Services.
Analysts at KPMG have taken note of the interest in financial technologies that are reshaping the way consumers and businesses bank, move and use money today. KPMG reports that global investments in fintech have surged at a blistering 51.4% compound annual growth rate from $100 million in 2008 to $19 billion in 2015.
With chops like he has against the lucrative industry backdrop, seeing what Griffin has cooking right now in the booming fintech space is certainly worth the time.
With Glance Pay, the user simply takes a picture of the bill within the app, enters the bill amount and tip and pays the bill all in a matter of a few seconds. Moreover, the app has a customer loyalty and rewards system integrated, saving that extra step to build points for future discounts.
The technology is underpinned by one of the most robust fraud systems on the market today. Since the launch of its latest version of the Glance Pay app eight months ago, the company boasts exactly zero fraudulent transactions at the hundreds of locations the app is being used. Comparatively, the company notes that Apple Pay – which obviously processes exponentially more transactions – experienced 6% fraud in the months following its launch. Glance thinks that the fraud threat is why Apple restricts tap payments to $100 or less, whereas Glance Pay speaks to the confidence it has in its security by placing no dollar limitations.
A finger just shouldn’t be pointed at Apple as credit card fraud is rampant in the world today, accounting for almost 3 out of every 5 fraudulent transactions currently. A finger should be pointed in the direction of Glance, though, as a provider of a leading technology to help tamp down the fraud rate.
The challenge for Glance Pay is that it is only available at affiliate restaurants and bars. Griffin and his team are systematically approaching through the classic model of proving the viability in a local market and then expanding. Glance Pay was first rolled out in the company’s home town of Vancouver, British Columbia where it was adopted by about 80 locations before sprawling into 230 restaurant locations across four provinces currently.
With its footprint growing in Canada, Glance earlier this month made the leap across the border into the United States. Not only did Glance set up a new head office in the tech hub of the world, Silicon Valley, it also signed on its first restaurant, Ta’cul Mexican Cocina in San Diego to use the Glance Pay mobile app.
“Our US expansion is key to our strategy of signing large North American restaurant chains,” said Griffin in the news release. “Silicon Valley is an ideal location for us to access the world’s premier high tech ecosystem as we continue to develop our technology.”
As if the $800 billion North American restaurant and bar industries weren’t enough, Glance also has its hands in the burgeoning cannabis market as well. Aiming to parlay into this explosive-growth space, the company’s partially-owned subsidiary, Cannapay, is in the midst of developing apps leveraging Glance Pay technology for mobile-to-mobile payments and mobile ordering and delivery services. Cannapay’s visions is broader than just the payment space, as it is establishing a consumer products division too, this month acquiring the global rights (ex-Canada) to all the intellectual property pertaining to the creation, production and manufacturing of ailment-treating Ayurveda formulas/products in addition to the rights to blend the products with cannabis to create new products.
The upstart only IPO’d on the Canadian Securities Exchange last fall and shares have bounced around, including hitting a low of 14 cents in July. That price point caught the eye of investors, with buying demand driving shares back up to as high as 34 cents at the end of August. Shares have consolidated some since, holding around 26 cents presently as they await their next catalyst.
