Verizon (News - Alert) Wireless, AT&T and T-Mobile are looking to invest an additional $100 million in their mobile payment joint venture known as Isis, Bloomberg reported on Monday, citing sources close to the situation.

If the initial investment proves fruitful, the carriers may spend hundreds of millions of dollars more to bring their mobile wallet software on the same level as Google, which launched a similar initiative earlier in the year.

The total amount of cash that is pumped into Isis will depend on whether banks and merchants embrace near field communication (NFC) technology, which enables consumers to make point-of-sale purchases by waving their mobile devices over checkout scanners.

The influx of funding comes one month after the carriers inked partnership agreements with the four major credit card companies. Isis originally planned on running the payment system on its own, but soon balked at the highly ambitious plan because it would be too difficult to succeed without the help of Visa, MasterCard (News - Alert), American Express and Discover, the Wall Street Journal reported in May.

Isis-enabled smartphones are set to be introduced in select locations in early 2012, with more widespread launches to follow. Meanwhile, Google Wallet is expected to make its first appearance in the coming weeks with the launch of the Google Nexus S, which will be carried by Sprint.

Although NFC technology has yet to become a consumer hit, analysts anticipate that it will soon become a major force in the payment industry.

“Over the long haul, operators have to create new businesses that derive value from more than access,” wireless analysts Chetan Sharma (News - Alert) told Bloomberg. “It's a given that people are going to be transacting more over cell phones. It could open a potential new revenue stream for them.”

Research firm Gartner (News - Alert) expects the market for mobile payments to increase to more than $1.1 trillion by 2014, up seven fold from current numbers.

The concept of the mobile wallet will be partially monetized through advertising. The joint venture of carriers will look to partner with merchants to offer users redeemable coupons and store loyalty credits through their mobile device.

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Beecher Tuttle is a TMCnet contributor. He has extensive experience writing and editing for print publications and online news websites. He has specialized in a variety of industries, including health care technology, politics and education. To read more of his articles, please visit his columnist page.

Edited by Jennifer Russell