News in brief from the NFC world and beyond: Austrian bus stops offer NFC updates • Caen gets NFC transit stops too • NFC tag store opens in Korea • Belgian museum offers NFC info • Gentag picks up patch patent • plus Clear2Pay, ITSO, TfL, FirstGroup, Google and more...
Austrian bus stops to offer NFC updates: 3,000 bus stops in the Austrian state of Salzburg are to be equipped with NFC-based information points by the end of the first quarter of 2012. Postbus passengers will be able to touch their phones to a tag at any stop and get details of the next five buses due along with information about any delays, according to der Standard.
Caen gets NFC transit stops: The 1,145 stops served by the French city of Caen's Twisto local transport service are being equipped with NFC and QR code-enabled posters. Customers can use the smart posters to find out when the next service will arrive, get travel alerts and see details of nearby stops and services. The 40,000 euro project also covers the city's V'eol bicycle rental service. Contactless transport payments are scheduled to be added in 2013.
Toronto parking goes contactless: 43 Toronto Parking Authority (TPA) Green P lots have been equipped to handle payments via Visa payWave contactless cards. To use the service, drivers simply swipe their contactless card at the entry and exit barriers.
NFC tag store opens in Korea: An online NFC tag store has opened its doors in Korea. The NFC Tagstore is run by Seoul-based RFID Systems, an established supplier of RFID inlays. It stocks a range of NFC tags and inlays produced by UPM RFID, provides a variety of off-the-shelf NFC applications and also offers smart posters and cards. Plans call for the store to expand into serving Japan, China and other Asian countries in the future.
Belgian museum gets NFC info: The Musée de la Céramique in Andenne has become the first museum in Belgium to add NFC tags to its exhibits, allowing visitors to tap their phones to information boards to discover details about the item on display.
Gentag picks up patch patent: Gentag has been granted a patent for disposable wireless skin patches that are readable by NFC cell phones, as well as other disposable NFC sensors for consumer applications, including medication, food safety, pathogen detection, cosmetics, and M2M markets.
Clear2Pay helps put in ITSO certification centre: Clear2Pay has helped establish a certification centre in the UK for ITSO, the government-backed not-for-profit organisation which defines and develops the UK-wide technical specification for smart ticketing. The company has also announced that its Integri EMV contactless card type approval level 1 test suite, an off-the-shelf tool for contactless card pre-certification and debugging, has been qualified by EMVCo.
SmartMetric sues Visa and MasterCard: The company has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Visa and Mastercard, "in defense of its US Patent 6,792,464 ('464 Patent) which provides patent protection concerning both 'contact' and 'contactless' smart card technology specifically when used to automatically access a credit card company network via such contact points as ATM machines or point of sale (POS) machines," says the company. "Smartmetric is seeking preliminary and permanent injunction against both Visa and Mastercard to prohibit them from further infringements along with a cash award for damages and a royalty payment."
UK transit operators make contactless moves: Transport for London (TfL) is continuing preparations for the arrival of contactless and NFC ticketing by closing a charging loophole. Oyster card users can be charged a maximum fare when they forget to 'touch out' of a station or bus journey. Now, when a passenger fails to touch out, the system will attempt to calculate what the fare should have been had they done so and a refund will be provided. FirstGroup, the UK's largest bus and rail operator, has meanwhile announced it will equip all its buses to accept contactless payments. The £27m (US$42.66) project will be completed by late 2012.
Google buys Zave: Mobile coupon specialist Zave Networks has been acquired by Google. The Zave platform is described as providing "a way to increase customer loyalty and traffic while digitally creating, measuring, redeeming and settling incentives."
And from around the web...
- Tianyi users pay bus fares with mobile phones in Xiamen & Zhangzhou — What's On Xiamen
- VeriFone raises outlook on mobile payment hopes — Reuters
- Wait to police mobile payments: Westpac — ZDNet Australia
- One in ten users redeem mobile coupons — Mobile Marketing Watch
- French operators launch mobile payment system Buyster — PC World
- Nokia to launch NFC Hub service in Singapore and Malaysia — Cnet Asia
- Diebold develops prototype ATM incorporating both biometrics and NFC — Press release
- File Expert Android app taps NFC to hasten your Bluetooth data transfers — Engadget
- Neowave launches Weneo 2.0, a new generation of NFC smart objects with the most advanced level of security and performances — Press release
- Germany's Federal Minister of the Interior broadens security cooperation with Infineon; Focus on the protection of critical infrastructures and security of mobile devices — Press release
- Global mobile payment transactions to total $945B in 2015 — a 30-fold jump from 2010, according to IE Market Research — Press release