If you live in Australia or New Zealand, you can now pay using Bitcoin at over 2000 Coca-Cola vending machines. The new development has been made possible via a deal between Centrapay and Coca-Cola Amatil, according to an announcement by Centrapay.
How Purchases will Work
Select vending machines across NZ and Australia have been fitted with QR code scanners. Users will then install Sylo smart wallet on their smartphone and scan the QR code. Once a customer pays using BTC, Coca-Cola is paid in NZ and Australian dollars with the price being calculated at the time of the transaction.
The Sylo smart wallet is a private messaging app with a digital wallet baked into it. Users can use the app to make video and audio calls, send messages, store crypto, and send and receive crypto coins via the chat feature. The app is available on iOS and Android devices.
Currently, only Bitcoin is accepted by the vending machines. However, there are plans to add other crypto coins in the future. Coca-Cola Amatil is one of the largest bottlers of non-alcoholic beverages in the Asia-Pacific region and they currently support 140 brands. The company has been working on the infrastructure to accept mobile wallets for several years.
Plans for the Future
According to Jerome Faury, the Centrapay CEO, the main obstacles to the adoption of Web 3.0 technologies such as crypto coin and digital identities are poor user experience and complexity. He added that the company had effectively solved the two issues. The CEO said that the company is working on ways to make the benefits of this new internet of value available to merchants and consumers.
On the issue of privacy, the CEO said that they were working on the creation of a future where people were in control of their digital identity and their data. In this future, the brand could ethically connect with the people, empowering them to make the right decisions while also supporting their partners.
He noted that since they had successfully demonstrated how the future of the internet could work in NZ and Australia, they wanted to expand globally. The CEO said they already had a presence in North America and they would be targeting the US next with some of the innovative solutions.
Good for the Health of the Community
The CEO also noted that the BTC purchases would reduce the contact people had with the vending machines. Physical contact with vending machines is a major issue for public health in the face of COVID19. As a result, the contactless purchases would contribute to arraying some of the public health concerns.
A Positive Move for Crypto Adoption
Coca-Cola Amatil is one of the biggest distributors of non-alcoholic beverages in NZ, Australia, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Fiji, and Indonesia. It works with 140 brands and it has around 270 million consumers. If they expand the service to other countries in the region, it could help to boost awareness on crypto as well as crypto adoption. It is a sign that crypto is gaining acceptance amongst mainstream companies.
Image Source: Pixabay
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