New Haven app developer/flutter developer announced this week that its app has been chosen to use Google Wallet Instant Buy integration, a virtual payment system for smartphones.

The program, which aims to make payments more efficient, is now available on one of MEA Mobile’s apps: Printicular, a photo printing service for smartphones that offers home photo delivery and pickup at Walgreens. Bruce Seymour, founder of MEA New Haven, said the app is a response to the recent decline in photo printing that has resulted from the surge in social media applications.

“With digital media, there’s a gap where people stopped printing photos,” he said.

The Google Wallet feature stores user credit and debit card information on a secure account, which allows users to make purchases without re-entering billing and shipping information. This technology is currently available for 100 other apps in the Google marketplace, according to Seymour. The app connects with users’ social media accounts to access photos to be printed.

Seymour said that, considering the Google marketplace contains roughly one million applications, he feels fortunate to have been one of the few chosen as a Google Wallet partner.

He added that, before Google Wallet was integrated into his app, there was always the danger of losing customers as they filled out the 12 required fields for photo delivery and pickup. Now, he said, the app has eliminated this “payment friction.”

“Instant Buy technology turns phones into wallets, allowing for simple, secure online payments as well as tap-and-pay transactions through integrated NFC technology,” Seymour said in a press release. “It securely stores credit cards, debit cards, gift cards, loyalty cards, offers and allows users to shop online and send money.”

According to Seymour, Printicular is the world’s fastest-growing photo printing app. He said that, during peak periods, the company prints 50,000 photos per day.

Lauren Beecher, a designer for Printicular, said the company’s ability to “stay relevant” in the tech community has afforded them the opportunity to be at the forefront of the market and adapt to the latest trends in technology.

She added that MEA Mobile is currently working on a number of projects for New Haven clients, including several projects for Yale.

Rohit Sharma, director of finance and innovation programs at the Economic Development Corporation of New Haven, said MEA Mobile has been an asset to the New Haven tech community in designing mobile apps for multiple startups.

He added that the company is unique in that functions as both a product firm and produces development work for other startups.

“A lot of the companies I’ve worked with needed an app, and MEA mobile is the go-to company,” Sharma said.

Printicular launched in 2012 on Android devices, and has since expanded to iPhone, iPad, Android, Windows Phone, Windows 8 Desktop, Blackberry and Kindle.

CAROLINE HART