Stratos Card, an all-in-one card like Coin, Plastc (not yet launched), and Wallaby (bought and repurposed by BankRate in December) launches today.

The card was conceived several years ago by CEO Thiago Olson and differs from Coin in significant ways. It feels different than other credit cards, with a textured finish, and contains touch sensitivity to move between cards along the lines of, but more elegantly than, Dynamics’ push buttons. It lacks a video screen, which Coin has, and a more sophisticated version of which Plastc will supposedly offer, and it carries two magstripes on the back. It also carries a users’ name on the front, which Olson is crucial for merchant comfort. Coin does not.

The two magstripes, Olson says, are there because traditional black magstripes carry three tracks — one is defunct, one carries name and other information, and one carries the account number. Cards need both stripes to work at nearly all card readers, some of which want one, some the other, and some, both. Loop — now part of Samsung Pay –which sends a magnetic signal, only sends one of the stripes, which means it only works at about 80% of magstripe machines, according to Olson. (Loop itself says that number is more like 90%.)

Stratos looks at its cards as pieces of technology — “It’s really like a wearable,” Olson told Bank Innovation, and more on that below — rather than just pieces of plastic. The company will offer cards as part of a membership package costing $95 for one year or $145 for two years, and a new card will be issued every year as part of that membership. This gets Stratos over the EMV hurdle that, among other things, confounded Coin. EMV versions are in the works.

The cards themselves cost as much as $10 to make, and EMV and further enhancements going forward will only add to that cost.

Membership in Stratos will be a “white-glove” service, relaying on the heavy use of black — as Coin does, as well as a prestige card for affluent millennials, Magnises — and what Olson called “Scandinavian design.” Five designs are available, and the membership kit is below.

But it’s in the mobile app integration that Stratos hopes to make its mark. Olson recognizes the primacy of the mobile device in everyday life, including increasingly payments. Every player in payments needs to explain how they stack up against Apple Pay, and Olson sees Stratos — which has raised $5.8 million of venture funding from Hyde Park Venture Partners and others — as a strong complement to Apple’s payment service.

“For one thing,” he said, “the card has immediate wider acceptance” than Apple Pay, working, he said, at nearly every point of sale in the U.S. “It also works in restaurants or bars, where you might not want to hand your phone over, or if you don’t completely trust the battery on your phone,” Olson said.

Olson sees the future of payments beyond cards, and so when he describes the card as a wearable, he isn’t kidding. It’s an appendage to the center of your financial life, he said, the mobile device.

“The card is really like a beacon,” he also said, meaning it is a relatively dumb device that connects (via BLE) to your mobile phone.

On the device there is significant Stratos functionality, such as messages that appear on the lock screen rather than forcing them to open apps. The Stratos app will allow for loyalty cards, physical or virtual, to be loaded onto Stratos immediately, and for toggling between cards. It could also mean that, if a card is compromised, a new card can be “sent” to the device instantly, as long as your issuer is on board with digital delivery.

The future for Stratos holds interactive notes on the device relating to a users’ array of cards, and P2P functionality. Users may even be able to virtually “loan” cards to friends within a geofence — afriend up at the bar, say. Using the app, a Stratos owner could “send” his card information to another user, allowing a user to buy drinks without getting up from his seat at the table. Good deal!

Olson is brimming with ideas like this. Cards may be passe in payments, but Apple Pay relies on them, and companies like Stratos are ensuring they’ll stay at the top of our virtual wallets for the foreseeable future.