US-based electronic payment services provider VeriFone has acquired WAY Systems, a provider of mobile POS and gateway services for mobile merchants.

Under the terms of the contract, VeriFone will take over support for WAY System’s 25,000 merchants within its PAYware Connect Gateway infrastructure.The purchase price consisted of an upfront payment of USD 6 million dollars and an earn-out payable in one year of up to an additional USD 3 million dollars should certain performance targets be met.

WAY Systems was founded in 2002 with initial seed capital from Bill Melton, the founder of VeriFone. The company was granted a number of patents in the US, Europe and China for a range of intellectual property, including the connection of a mag-stripe reader to a mobile phone, PDA (personal digital assistant) or smartphone.