Intesa Sanpaolo begins NFC trial in Italy
By Sarah Clark 
| nfcworld.com | January 16th, 2012
The Italian financial institution's new "Move and Pay" NFC payments service is being provided in conjunction with mobile service provider Noverca, in which Intesa is a shareholder.
INTESA: Issuing SIMs through an MVNO
Intesa Sanpaolo, Italy's largest financial institution and one of Europe's top ten, has begun field testing a SIM-based NFC payments service called "Move and Pay".
The technology being used in the trial has been developed by Intesa Sanpaolo with Setefi, a wholly owned Intesa subsidiary with major merchant acquiring, payments processing and card management operations. SIMs are issued by Noverca, a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) in which Intesa holds a one-third stake.
Six hundred Intesa Sanpaolo employees and customers in the cities of Milan and Turin, as well as academics from the Polytechnic Institute of Milan and Turin ISMB, are taking part in the trial. Each participant is being sent a Noverca SIM, Samsung Wave 578 NFC phone and a companion Superflash card, a reloadable prepaid card issued by Intesa, allowing them to make payments at any MasterCard PayPass-equipped point-of-sale.
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