Abstract: Continue investing in technology as outlined in 2017 with minor refinements.

In last year’s Outlook for the coming year, Mercator Advisory Group’ Emerging Technologies Advisory Service argued that payment solution providers should immediately invest in tokenization, machine learning, and application programming interfaces (APIs). This year we argue for more of the same. Of the three, machine learning has become entangled in major hype, yet it has demonstrated that it can be applied very broadly, not just applied to Big Data and fraud, and so it demands even greater attention. The networks continue to deliver new tokenized services to market that require new tactics and will further enable e-commerce. Banks, networks, and processors offer APIs through developer websites.