The United States, the largest payment card market in the world, will be the featured country during the 23rd edition of CARTES & Identification Nov. 4 through Nov. 6 in Paris. The country has adopted contactless payments as well as secure identity programs such as the 13 million Common Access Cards that have already been issued by the Department of Defense.

Telecom Italia, an Italian land-based and mobile phone company, has entered a partnership with MasterCard that enables customers to make main payments from their mobile phone, according to an AGI News article. By using Near Field Communication technology a customer will be able to perform transactions such as recharge prepaid cards or transfer money between personal accounts.

Alcatel-Lucent has introduced a new consumer-oriented RFID product, the Tikitag, at this week’s DemoFall 2008 conference. The new system offers a new way to link offline objects to the digital world.

The latest study from UK-based Juniper Research projects that 700 million mobile subscribers globally will have phones equipped with NFC contactless technology by 2013. That’s still less than half of the estimated two billion cell phones currently in use.

In the second report in its Mobile Payment Markets series, Juniper found that there is a significant opportunity for NFC mobile payment services, chips, phones and supporting services as the market reaches its tipping point over the 2011 to 2013 period.

By Andy Williams, Contributing Editor

The state of the contactless payments industry is up for debate depending on whom you ask. Recent issuance statistics have led some to claim victory, while others have interpreted the same numbers in a much more negative manner. “You are definitely going to get a glass half full glass half empty difference,” says Randy Vanderhoof, executive director of the Smart Card Alliance.

Javelin Strategy, a Pleasanton, Calif.-based research group, released a report in the spring stating that contactless technology hasn’t taken off as fast as many thought it would. Researchers don’t agree on how many contactless cards are out there – in the U.S. or even throughout the world – possibly because of the reluctance by credit card companies to release precise country-by-country figures.

A series of Web-based seminars beginning Sept. 25 and co-sponsored by the Smart Card Alliance and the Electronic Transactions Association will feature the use of mobile phones for banking and payments. The first session with an NFC focus, will last 90 minutes with three other webinars covering various areas of smart card payments scheduled for later this year and early 2009.

Visa has launched four new programs designed to deliver payments and services via mobile devices. Two commercial mobile payments programs in Brazil and Korea, along with two mobile offers and transaction notification pilots in the United States now add to more than a dozen pilot and commercial programs enabled by the Visa mobile platform.

The mobile wallet may be a full-fledged reality in five years, according to the latest report from UK-based Juniper Research. Its new Mobile Payments Study projects that purchases using NFC-enabled phones coupled with money transfers could total $600 billion globally by 2013.

The report’s author, Howard Wilcox, commented that this growth will be “driven by both the rapid availability of exciting, easy to use services, and the continued growth in mobile subscriber penetration, particularly in developing countries. As well as becoming multifunctional devices for many users, mobiles will become wallets that people won’t leave the home or office without.”

Seventy-eight percent of participants in London’s near field communication trial said they would use the technology again, according to a Finextra news report. The six-month pilot was run by mobile operator O2 with Transport for London, device manufacturer Nokia, and card issuer Visa and TranSys, the group that runs the Oyster card system.

The conglomerate gave 500 Londoners NFC-enabled devices that could be swiped across Oyster card readers in London Underground stations and in buses. Barclaycard also credited 225 of the 500 phones with $350 worth of non-reloadable funds for making low value contactless payments at retailers, including Books Etc, Chop’d, Coffee Republic, EAT, Krispy Kreme, Threshers and YO! Sushi.

Glue4 Technologies, a UK technology company, has rebranded as Proxama. The company provides solutions for contactless payments, ticketing and loyalty. The rebrand marks the company’s continuation in helping consumers get more from smart cards, NFC, mobile phones, the Web and interactive TV.

Proxama makes its formal entry into the consumer technologies market with a number of clients, including Virgin Mobile, Sky, BT and MasterCard. The company also has a large number of business partnerships helping it to build open and flexible solutions that can be integrated with other service and solution providers.