Near Field Communications Handsets and Tags, NFC Pilots and Projects

NFC shopping pilot underway in Zurich

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

NEXPERTS, e24, the University of Applied Science from Northwest Switzerland and other industrial partners are launching a pilot project this month in Zurich that will enable customers to use their NFC phones to purchase goods and services at farmer shops.

The project, called “Touch’n Pay,” is intended to ease the shopping process in farmer shops, which are typically small, independent stores lacking a point of sale terminal infrastructure. The 80 customers participating in the pilot will be able to get information on a particular item by simply touching the price tag with their phones. A shopping basket application on the phone then sums up all articles and by a tapping the “checkout” tag, the electronic payment process will be initiated.


NFC enabled customers can also access to the farmer’s shop around the clock by opening the door-lock cylinder with a touch by their mobile phone.

The results from the project will be collected and analyzed by the University of Applied Sciences from Northwest Switzerland for future large scale deployments. [end] 

HID Global has announced the successful completion of the world’s first university pilot of NFC smart phones carrying digital keys.

First announced in September, the pilot involved a select group of students and staff at Arizona State University using NFC-enabled smart phones equipped with HID’s Secure Identity Object (SIO) Technology. Participants could gain access to their residence halls and other secure access areas by tapping their handset against a reader embedded in the door and entering a PIN, rather than use their plastic campus card.

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As some may recall back in June 2010, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) of New York launched tap-and-go contactless payments for commuters to enter select subway stations and participating bus lines using MasterCard PayPass-enabled terminals. Well, the results are in.

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la Caixa and Visa Europe have begun rolling out their contactless payment system in Barcelona. The bank is set to make all cards and point-of-sale across Barcelona contactless, requiring the distribution of 1 million cards and more than 15,000 new POS terminals.

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Biometrics enable expedited border screening

The U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Global Entry program is expanding enabling enrolled U.S. citizens to enjoy expedited screening when returning from travel abroad to a number of domestic airports. The program also makes them eligible to participate in similar programs at foreign airports.

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Think&Go NFC, a French provider of mobile retail solutions, has announced the creation of an NFC-enabled Home Shopping system.

Designed to streamline the reordering of common consumer goods, the Home Shopping solution consists of a mobile app, a “Home Shopping board” and a Web site where consumers preferred services can be configured.

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The Authority for Info-communications Technology Industry of Brunei Darussalam (AITI) in collaboration with the Ministry of Religious Affairs (MoRA) announced a pilot project to track ‘halal’ food products through the use of RFID technology, according to The Brunei Times.

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