The already fast pace of change in mobile payments will only intensify in the next year driven by advances in technology and changing consumer habits. Voice-enabled technology will rise in popularity, driven by the proliferation of devices such as the Amazon Echo and growing comfort with virtual assistants such as Amazon's Alexa, a large part of Amazon's payments strategy. Amazon reported that the Amazon Echo Dot was the best-selling item on Amazon on Black Friday, meaning millions of households are likely to be setting up their new Echo on Christmas morning. As consumers become more comfortable with voice-enabled technology, they will begin using it for financial interactions. Initially these will be informational activities, such as checking balances and accessing account activity, but as comfort grows we'll see consumers initiating transactions such as paying bills or transferring funds.

NEW YORK & LAS VEGAS--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Today at Money 20/20, Mastercard announced its plans to launch artificial intelligence (AI) bots that allow consumers to transact, manage finances, and shop via messaging platforms. According to research firm Gartner, nearly $2 billion in online sales will be performed exclusively through mobile digital assistants by the end of 2016.1 Mastercard is developing bots for both its merchant and bank partners, which will use chat, messaging and natural language interfaces to communicate with consumers. With the Mastercard bots, partners can have a true dialogue with consumers and provide personalized service, seamless user experience and contextual offers and rewards. Mastercard KAI, the Mastercard bot for banks, will seamlessly extend Mastercard services to customers on messaging platforms and make financial information and decisions part of consumers' everyday lives. In this testing phase on Messenger, Mastercard is partnering with Kasisto, the company that created KAI Banking, the conversational artificial intelligence (AI) platform, to power branded virtual assistants and smart bots for financial services and is a current participant in the Mastercard Start Path Global program.