Could Apple’s iTunes announcement include NFC?
OPINION: The last 48 hours have seen a rush of announcements showing that near field communication is moving rapidly to widespread adoption:... More
OPINION: The last 48 hours have seen a rush of announcements showing that near field communication is moving rapidly to widespread adoption:... More
OPINION: After years of low profile technical development, it’s now becoming clear that the commercial arrival of NFC is going to be very high profile indeed. And that high profile is set to bring further complications to those looking to commercialise NFC services. More
OPINION: Almost from nowhere, interest in near field communication technology has exploded in the US over the last few weeks as key potential market players have begun to reveal their hands. More
OPINION: The Finnish phone giant has become the first major manufacturer to commit to building NFC into its devices, with the announcement that all its new smartphones will come with the technology built-in from 2011. Just as one problem seems to have been solved, however, a new battlefield is now emerging in the retail payments space. More
OPINION: Licensing deals signed by Innovision will see NFC functionality being built into 15% to 20% of the handsets shipped in 2012, says the company, as leading mobile phone chipset manufacturers look for low cost ways to add NFC into mass market mobile phones. More
OPINION: News from Turkey, France and China this week indicates that the NFC market is now beginning to gather pace around the world, as both mobile network operators and banks in more and more countries commit to working together to make near field communication based services a reality. More
OPINION: NFC silicon suppliers Inside Contactless and NXP both say they now expect to see a range of Android NFC phones arriving on the market from the end of this year with, says Inside’s Loic Hamon, a “vast portfolio of phones next year for sure.” More
OPINION: While the steady stream of new NFC patent applications from Apple over the last few months has been interesting, it has been important to not get too excited — there’s a big difference between a company filing a patent application and actually building a new technology into its products. This week, however, everything has changed. More
OPINION: Korean mobile network operator SK Telecom’s new T Smart Pay service comes with more than one twist to the ‘standard’ NFC business model. Not only has SKT bought its way into a card issuer for the launch, but it is also signing distribution deals with leading retailers. More
OPINION: Interest in near field communication is gathering pace in the financial services sector, fuelled by the arrival of NFC-enabled microSD cards and a recognition that there is a business model to be found — so long as you look for it hard enough. More
OPINION: A host of new NFC products and initiatives were announced at this year’s Mobile World Congress but, it seems, we will have to wait until the end of this year before the first NFC handsets become widely available in the West. More
OPINION: One of the key forecasts in our new report ‘NFC: The Road to Commercial Deployment’ is that successful NFC services will require one company to firmly take the lead, and that this will inevitably see banks and mobile network operators going head-to-head in a battle to win control of consumers’ mobile wallets. More
OPINION: It has become received wisdom in NFC circles that Japan and Korea, where mobile contactless services were successful established by one lead player, are unique and can’t be repeated elsewhere. More
OPINION: 2010 is set to be a key year for NFC as mobile network operators, banks and potential service providers switch from small scale trials to pre-commercial pilots in readiness for the first commercial launches in 2011. More
OPINION: The news that Malaysian manufacturer Fonelabs is to produce two million NFC phones in 2010 is the first sign that the issue of a lack of NFC handsets is beginning to be resolved. More
OPINION: The Cartes show in Paris this week was a hotbed of new NFC product launches, firmly putting it on the list of must-attend events for anyone looking to keep on top of developments in the NFC industry. More
OPINION: It was a year ago this week that we began publishing Near Field Communications World. A year on, we’re sending out today’s newsletter to more than 8,000 people and our website has served visitors from over 150 countries around the world. More
OPINION: The past fortnight has seen announcements of new NFC services from banks and operators in both Dubai and Kuwait. More
OPINION: Take up of the new sticker-based Redi Pay Bling mobile payments service by the customers of The State Bank of La Junta, a small Colorado farming community, has reached 80% in less than five months. More
OPINION: In most countries, the maximum transaction limit for a contactless payment is set low enough that only small items such as cups of coffee and bus tickets can be purchased. That may not, however, be what consumers want — and it could be leading to the potential revenues from NFC payments being seriously underestimated. More