PayPal has introduced a rewards program for “our most active and enthusiastic customers who use PayPal online, in store, or on mobile devices”... More
Archive: News in brief
PosteMobile to roll out NFC
PosteMobile, the mobile network provider owned by the Italian postal service, has signed an MVNO agreement with carrier Wind that will see the company extending NFC payments capabilities to all its three million customers... More
Apple Japan adds digital gift card
Apple has introduced a digital version of the iTunes gift card in Japan that replaces the need for customers to buy a physical card... More
Alpha Bank launches NFC in Greece
Greece’s Alpha Bank has officially launched its Tap n Pay NFC mobile payment service... More
DMA warns on push messaging
One in three UK smartphone or tablet owners have never enabled push notifications on their connected devices and 78% of those who have enabled it would immediately delete the app or disable the notification if they were unhappy with the push notifications they receive, a DMA UK survey has found... More
Toshiba offers dynamic NFC tag
Toshiba has introduced an NFC Forum Type 3 tag chip that includes a wired interface, enabling it to be used to collect and store dynamic data generated by “normally standalone products, such as calculators, clocks, and healthcare items”... More
Singapore ups contactless spending
Singapore’s United Overseas Bank has reported a more than three-fold increase in contactless card transactions in the year to April 2014, with more than 500 contactless purchases now being made each day... More
1.75bn to use mobile banking
More than 1.75 billion mobile phone users will have used their device for banking purposes by the end of 2019, up from 800 million people this year, according to a new Juniper Research forecast... More
PayPal pays next day
PayPal is piloting Next-Day Settlement (NDS), a new service that cuts the time taken for transfers between a merchant’s PayPal account and their bank account from the usual three or four days to 24 hours... More
China UnionPay to offer QR payments?
China UnionPay is developing a QR code-based mobile payment service that will provide a way to make both online and offline mobile payments, according to Marbridge Consulting... More
New IoT consortium launches
Atmel, Broadcom, Dell, Intel, Samsung and Wind River have formed the Open Interconnect Consortium (OIC), a new industry grouping that aims to improve the interoperability and define the connectivity requirements for the Internet of Things (IoT)... More
Seqr heads to UK
Swedish firm Seamless, developer of the NFC and QR-based Seqr mobile payments service, has signed deals with Optimal Payments and Contis Group to bring the solution to the UK... More
Synchrony invests in LoopPay
Synchrony Financial, formerly GE Capital Retail Finance, has made “a strategic investment” in LoopPay, developer of a mobile phone add-on that lets US consumers make payments at merchants equipped with magnetic stripe card terminals... More
60m BLE beacons to ship by 2019
Sixty million Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons worth US$500m will be shipped in 2019, ABI Research forecasts... More
Tamagotchi 4U to come with NFC
Japanese toy maker Bandai is to include NFC in the next version of its Tamagotchi electronic pets, enabling owners to tap their device on ‘Touch Spots’ and against other Tamagotchis and smartphones to exchange items and play games... More
Diebold and Wincor Nixdorf form ATM security alliance
ATM manufacturers Diebold and Wincor Nixdorf have partnered to found an association aimed at working to improve cash machine security. The ATM Security Association aims to compile information on recognised and potential attack scenarios, and share it with specific industry groups to rapidly deploy and implement counter-measures at a global level... More
Robin raises funds for BLE in the office
Boston startup Robin has closed a US$1.4m seed funding round to expand and develop a solution that uses iBeacons and Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) to let workers interact with the office space around them... More
Taiwanese banks to set up their own NFC TSM
Taiwan’s Fair Trade Commission has approved a plan to establish a TSM platform that the country’s financial institutions will be able to use to introduce mobile payments services, Want China Times reports... More
Indonesia to get NFC payments
Indonesian mobile network operator Telkomsel is to launch an NFC mobile payment service in October this year, in partnership with a bank, according to Indonesian Business Daily... More
Restaurant inspectors add QR info
New inspection placards that include QR codes are to be issued by the US city of Pasadena’s Public Health Department for display in restaurants and other food outlets... More