Pinterest has a new CEO. Google needs to simplify its Payments strategy. The two are related.
On June 4th we wrote (article HERE), that Google’s Payments strategy is confusing given the company’s three-pronged approach to consumer-facing payment apps – Google Pay, G-Pay and Google Wallet. Much of our surprise was due to the fact that the person who was leading Google’s Payments business (along with Google Commerce), was former PayPal (PYPL), COO Bill Ready – a payments-focused executive that we have tracked since 2006 during his time at iPay. We have significant respect for Mr. Ready’s Payments knowledge and found it surprising that he would allow such a product and market positioning blunder (our opinion), to occur on his watch. Well, Bill Ready no longer leads Google’s Payments and Commerce efforts as he was named the new CEO of Pinterest (PINS), replacing co-founder and CEO Ben Silbermann who will become Executive Chairman. We do not have inside knowledge as to what happened between Mr. Ready and Google, but suffice to say Google needs to tighten-up its product and market positioning strategy as it relates to Google’s payment-related products and services. Priority one ought to be for Google to consolidate its somewhat duplicative “Google Pay” and “G-Pay” apps. Read about Mr. Ready replacing Mr. Silbermann at Pinterest HERE.