INSIDE Contactless, Connecthings aim to take NFC to next level
08 September, 2009
category: Biometrics, Financial, NFC, Transit
Chip maker INSIDE Contactless and Connecthings, a provider of tags and location and time-based content management systems, have announced a partnership to drive NFC deployments beyond payment and transit applications. The two companies intend to develop, promote and commercialize the Wave-Me NFC services platform, a solution carriers and third-party service providers can use to give subscribers access to a broad range of consumer services and applications through their mobile phones.
With this partnership the two companies hope to define the intelligent interfaces and protocols necessary for communication between NFC handsets, NFC tags and the platform. INSIDE will provide its NFC technology know-how, NFC hardware, loadable application-level software for the handset, Wave-Me products, NFC tags and other patented technology. Connecthings brings knowledge from its AdTag server-side contextualized content management, as well as its experience with NFC tag and mobile application life cycle management and other technologies.
Wave-Me-enabled handsets will allow people to access relevant, profile-based services with a simple gesture. When “waved” near a corresponding Wave-Me NFC tag, the technology automatically simulates a series of keystrokes, eliminating time-consuming, multi-keystroke chores. Wave-Me tags could also contain relevant phone numbers or complex URLs to send SMS messages or send and retrieve information from web sites.
Merchants and other businesses will be able to sponsor Wave-Me applications, with the possibility of displaying branding information not only on the tag, but also on the handset screen with accompanying sound or music. Museums and cities will be able to provide Wave-Me applications to their visitors, with the possibility of using NFC tags deployed in their environment to access services. INSIDE and Connecthings plan to demonstrate the Wave-Me NFC services platform later this year.
“When INSIDE announced its Wave-Me technologies in February of this year, we introduced our vision of a service-rich future for NFC, and the partnership we are announcing today is an important step in realizing that vision,” said Loic Hamon, INSIDE’s vice president marketing for NFC. “Together with Connecthings, we are developing the key infrastructure elements that will give operators and service providers a powerful NFC service delivery platform and transform how people interact with and use their mobile devices.”