CPI Card Group and INSIDE Contactless have introduced a next-generation tag that enables mobile devices to make MasterCard PayPass and Discover Zip contactless payments. The stickers, which are manufactured by CPI and based on INSIDE’s MicroPass 4003 contactless payment processor, contain all the functionality of traditional MasterCard PayPass and Discover Zip credit, debit or prepaid […]

Banks, telcos, TSMs … Who will get paid in the NFC ecosystem? By Autumn C. Giusti, Contributing Editor, AVISIAN Publications Will that be Visa, MasterCard or iPhone? That’s the question banks and cell phone companies are hoping to hear more of in the next few years as the contactless payment world prepares to make the […]

STMicroelectronics, NXP, Trusted Logic and Stollmann have announced that they will promote a common hardware-independent API (Application Programming Interface) for NFC applications on Android mobile devices. The NFC API will enable developers to create NFC applications to be distributed through app stores, granting Android users access to a range of contactless applications, including mobile payments, […]

O2, a European mobile operator and subsidiary of Telefonica, has announced its strategy to launch contactless mobile payment, according to mobilebusinessbriefing.com. In 2008, O2 collaborated with Visa, Barclays and Transport for London to pilot London’s Oyster travel cards on Nokia smart handsets to kick off its O2 Wallet initiative. Then in 2009, O2 partnered with […]

Visa’s contactless payWave system has seen steady growth in Canada as more and more merchants implement the new payment technology. Paywave, which enables Canadians to make quick and secure transactions by simply tapping their card against a POS reader, is already in place at many popular Canadian establishments, including SUBWAY, Second Cup, The Jean Coutu […]

The United Arab Emirates is experiencing a delay in its commercial launch of NFC mobile payment due to a lack of phones, readers and SIM cards, according to Emirates Business 24/7. The shortage has put on hold two major deployments – one involving Dubai First Bank and Telecom service provider Du; the other involving etisalat, […]

InterContinental Hotels Group is planning to pilot a new technology that allows guests to unlock their hotel-room door via smart phone, according to USA Today. IHG executive Bryson Koehler says the new system will let users skip the check-in desk and avoid the burden of carrying around another item, instead being able to use their […]

MasterCard and Gemalto have announced a new pilot featuring an NFC-enabled device that can be inserted into a mobile phone to turn it into payment device. The wafer-thin device, which leverages Gemalto’s Upteq N-Flex Solution and MasterCard’s PayPass, is the first of its kind to function on multiple mobile handsets, which Gemalto says will help […]

Watchdata has announced the continued successful deployment of its SIMpass mobile payment solution in China. Around 200,000 China Telecom subscribers will soon be able to make low-value purchases in 11 cities of Jiangsu Province with local transit, e-purse or campus applications stored on SIMpass mobile cards. SIMpass was first launched with China Telecom in December […]

Germany’s Stollmann announced the first chip set independent NFC application programming interface (API) for Android. The “NFaCe+A” API supports all NFC modes and features and can be used with different chip sets and NFC protocol stacks, including those from STMicroelectronics, NXP, Innovison, Polaric and more. The API, which is targeted for developers of standard NFC […]