Passengers on the SoundRunner ferry connecting the Port of Kingston to downtown Seattle will be able to pay for their fares with contactless ORCA cards starting this week, according to Kitsap Sun. The ORCA (“One Regional Card for All”) system is supported by transit agencies throughout Kitsap, King, Pierce and Snohomish counties in Washington. As […]

BPC Banking Technologies and Alfa-Bank have teamed up to complete the first certified Visa PayWave launch in Russia, according to RFP Connect. Alfa-Bank, which boasts some 200 branches throughout Russia, will distribute contactless PayWave Visa cards to its customers to enable low-value contactless payments at the point of sale. To pay, customers need only tap […]

Aconite has announced the release of its new Mobile Application Manager, a solution that enables application issuers, such as banks and transit operators, to install and manage the life-cycles of apps in an NFC-enabled mobile handset’s Secure Element. The solution, which is based on the new standards for mobile application management and security from GlobalPlatform, […]

United Arab Emirates-based telecom Etisalat is partnering with MasterCard and Network International to launch nationwide NFC payments. Scheduled to launch this fall, the service will enable Etisalat customers with Blackberry 9900 smart phones to make contactless purchases at more than 600 retail locations in the UAE that already accept MasterCard PayPass contactless payments. Customers using […]

Atria Books has announced the release of the company’s first “smart book,” a physical book tagged with an NFC chip that provides the reader with additional content. According to Atria, 1,000 copies of Gary Schwartz’s The Impulse Economy will hit the shelves with a smart book sticker, which readers can tap with their NFC-enabled phones […]

BrandTable Concept from S_Digital on Vimeo. University of Sydney start-up SDigital has designed a system that enable mall food court patrons to place and pay for their orders without ever having to leave the table. According to Endgadget, the system uses a series of NFC-enabled branded coasters – i.e. KFC, McDonald’s etc. – containing a […]

Nokia has announced that it will work with the New York Metropolitan Transit Authority to pilot NFC-enabled mobile ticketing. According to a small footnote on a recent Nokia press release, the Finnish company has reached an agreement with the MTA to develop a NFC-based smart phone ticketing solution that will be piloted on New York […]

Multicard has announced the expanded roll out of its Cashless Betalen mobile banking solution with NFC payment stickers across the Netherlands. Cashless Betalen, the account management application behind the digital wallet offered by Rabobank, enables users to check their account balances, transfer and deposit funds and make payments and can be accessed via any connected […]

VeriFone Systems has revealed a new counter top payment terminal that accepts magnetic stripe, EMV chip, contactless card and NFC mobile transactions. According to VeriFone, the “H5000” is designed to succeed the Artema Hybrid terminal from Hypercom, which Verifone acquired in August. The device features one card reader slot that accommodates all card types – […]

Research In Motion’s BlackBerry Bold 9900 (pictured) and BlackBerry Curve 9360 smart phones have become the first SIM-based NFC handsets receive MasterCard PayPass certification. According to RIM, any bank around the globe offering MasterCard PayPass technology can now deploy PayPass accounts directly to the SIM card on both smart phones, enabling owners to make contactless […]