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Korean mobile network operator SK Telecom‘s subsidiary SK Planet has launched an NFC couponing service in the Shin-Okubo neighbourhood of Tokyo, the centre of the city’s Korean community, in partnership with Japanese carriers KDDI and Softbank Mobile... More
SoftBank Mobile has selected Gemalto as its trusted service manager for the commercial launch of NFC services in Japan... More
Japan Airlines (JAL) has added coupons and special offers to its NFC-enabled boarding pass service and announced plans to extend operations to include customers of all three of Japan’s mobile network operators... More
The joint venture between Sony and carrier NTT Docomo, which runs Japan’s Osaifu-Keitai mobile wallet service, has signed a deal with Samsung for the development of a new chip solution that will provide consumers with phones which work with both NFC services and Japan’s existing mobile payments infrastructure. More
The mobile network operator will begin commercial NFC services from the end of January with partners including Japan Airlines, credit card issuers, loyalty programme providers and retailers. More
NTT Docomo, KDDI and Softbank Mobile have set up the Japan Mobile NFC Consortium with the aim of working together to coordinate the switch from Japan’s existing Osaifu-Keitai non-NFC standard mobile payments system to NFC. More
Japanese mobile network operator Softbank, card issuer Credit Saison and American Express have teamed up with NFC technology providers Dai Nippon Printing and Gemalto to test SIM-based NFC payments on Android phones... More
The mobile network operators have signed up to support and implement SIM-based NFC in a move the GSMA says will “promote the global interoperability of services and accelerate time-to-market”. More
Analysis by Comscore for its 2010 Mobile Year in Review has found that just under 10% of Japanese mobile subscribers made a purchase with their mobile wallet during December 2010... More
The GSMA has issued a statement outlining a commitment by leading global mobile network operators — many of whom have not previously been involved in NFC — to launch commercial services in 2012. “The operator community is focused on driving the standardised deployment of mobile NFC, using the SIM as the secure element to provide authentication, security and portability,” says the announcement. More
Toshiba has announced it has now completed testing of an NFC UIM, a user identity module that can be used in both CDMA2000 NFC phones and as a SIM card for GSM NFC phones, and is now ready to begin mass production... More
The three mobile network operators, who signed an NFC cooperation agreement in July 2010, are to begin testing a number of cross-border NFC services this month with the aim of launching commercial services by the end of 2011. More
Mobile network operator NTT Docomo, the driving force behind Japan’s Osaifu-Keitai mobile wallet service, has confirmed that it will make the move to NFC standard technology from “around the end of 2012”, in partnership with Korea’s KT. More
Softbank Mobile has partnered with credit card issuers Credit Saison and Orient Corporation to test NFC on HTC Android smartphones equipped with a SIM+antenna solution and mobile wallet software. More
NTT Docomo is set to make the switch to NFC standard technology in 2013, according to a report in Japanese business newspaper Nihon Keizai Shimbun... More
A new report from financial services analysts Celent forecasts that the mobile contactless payments market in South Korea is set to grow at an average compound annual growth rate of some 50%... More
The payments processing giant has signed a deal with Korea’s SK C&C, responsible for the technology behind SK Telecom’s mobile contactless payments service, and will begin offering a turnkey NFC payments service to US banks from the first quarter of 2011. More
The three mobile network operators are to move away from the non-NFC mobile contactless technologies they currently support in favour of an NFC standard solution. More
Carl Atsushi Hirano, the driving force behind the introduction five years ago of Japan’s Osaïfu Keitai mobile wallet service, has set out his thinking on what was required to make the service a success and what it will take to successfully introduce NFC services in other countries. More
The mobile industry association has finalised its device requirements for NFC handsets and called on manufacturers to put phones incorporating the Single Wire Protocol interface into consumers’ hands by the middle of next year. More