Salt Lake City

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We noted last week that carrier-backed Google Wallet competitor Isis was nearing an official launch when we noticed the T-Mobile ISIS app on Google Play. Today, the app officially launches on all three of its major carrier partners in Salt Lake City, Utah and Austin, Texas. ISIS issued a press release on its website today to confirm the service would be available to nine “Isis Ready” handsets through Verizon, T-Mobile, and AT&T. It will also land on a total of 20 devices by the end of 2012.

“Today’s launch of the Isis Mobile Wallet is a significant achievement in terms of enabling consumer adoption of mobile payments,” said Suzan Kereere, senior vice president and general manager, American Express, Global Network Business.  “Mobile commerce holds the promise of dramatically enhancing consumers’ shopping experience, and American Express’ first priority as a network is to provide choice and flexibility for all industry participants as we work together to influence the speed and growth of mobile NFC payments in the U.S.”

The service will be made available to compatible devices, which the press release failed to list, and it can be activated with a secure element SIM card at one of the partner carrier’s retail stores in Austin and Salt Lake City. We know on T-Mobile you’ll be able to use at least the Galaxy S III and Galaxy Relay 4G. You can see Verizon’s selection here. Isis also has a full list of participating merchants here.

Like T-Mobile, ISIS apps for both Verizon and AT&T are now available on Google Play.

The full press release from Isis is below:
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ISIS, a mobile payment partnership between AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon, has released its first app onto Google Play that was pushed back from the initial September plan. The app, ISIS Mobile Wallet, only works with the Galaxy S III and Galaxy Relay 4G on T-Mobile in Salt Lake City, Utah or Austin, and it requires a special SIM card courtesy of ISIS, as MobileBurn noted. T-Mobile and the ISIS have not announced anything specific about the app, but you can give it a test run over at Google Play.

There is no word if AT&T or Verizon will receive a similar app for its NFC-enabled devices. If you are wondering about the nation’s No. 3 carrier, Sprint is not apart of the ISIS. It is partnered with Google Wallet on many of its phones. Furthermore, Sprint is rumored to announce its own payment platform sometime in the future.

Yesterday, TmoNews reported that T-Mobile users would receive a $25 credit when signing up and the service will officially launch in a pilot program Oct. 22.

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We knew Google Wallet would not be the only mobile payment solution on the market back in December 2011 when carriers moved to block the service in anticipation of their own ISIS mobile payment project. Today, a report from TmoNews, citing an image of internal T-Mobile documents, claimed the carrier is getting ready for a pilot program of ISIS starting Oct. 22.

According to the document, the ISIS Mobile Wallet service will roll out via the Google Play store to Galaxy S III and Galaxy S Relay 4G users in Salt Lake City, Utah and Austin, Texas. It will also require an ISIS SIM card, but T-Mobile will offer $25 in ISIS cash as a special offer for activating the service:

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