SITA Lab and Orange get together to trial NFC at airport models

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SITA Lab and Orange get together to trial NFC at airport models

SITA Lab and Orange have recently got together to look further into the use cases for NFC for passengers, airlines and the security at airports. The thought of giving an NFC ticket at the airport is not a new concept. However, apart from a couple of airlines trialling NFC with stickers and apps, we are yet to see anything truly ubiquitous and usable for users across the globe. The SITA and Orange research project developed NFC apps for smartphones that allow NFC boarding passes, security check-ins, lounge check-ins and checked them out with real technology to show how NFC holds the possibility to streamline airport processes, improve security and generally make travel less frustrating for flyers. This is in part because IATA and the GSMA have developed industry use cases for NFC that cover check-in, security access, boarding and lounge access. NFC boarding pass information can be loaded securely to the travel wallet from online, over the air or at a kiosk.

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Ordering and paying for snacks in an Australian cinema using NFC

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MasterCard Commonwealth Bank and Hoyts partner for ordering and paying for snacks in Australian cinemas using NFC

MasterCard, Commonwealth Bank, and Hoyts cinemas have partnered to bring a new facility for cinema goers that allows an app, NFC tag or QR code to be used to order and pay for food or snacks in Sydney theaters. Australia has embraced NFC and smartphones quickly and, in fact, Google stats show that smartphone penetration in Oz outpaces everywhere else globally. It’s a pretty natural progression of NFC payments to see niche apps that allow you to purchase items and browse menus in different environments. Whether that be on a plane, at a theme park or even at a cinema (Americans, read movies).

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TazTag shows off the TazPad and NFC smart monitors at CES

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TazTag shows off the TazPad and NFC smart monitors at CES

It was last year at CES that a startup French firm called TazTag first showed of its TazPad NFC tablet concept. It wasn’t the firm’s first foray into NFC and, in fact, they were known in Europe for kiosks that supported NFC interactions and transactions. Since then, the TazPad production NFC tablet, with a helpful sprinkling of ZigBee, has been deployed to integrators and the orders just keep coming in according to executives at the firm. Of course, the fact that NFC can be read on both side of the device, its AuthenTec fingerprint scanner and its low price didn’t hurt its chances any. The fact that the TazPad was the first NFC tablet to hit the market globally also gave it a certain fame and a lot of coverage, including here on NFC Rumors.

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OpenWays launches NFC hotel key system without SWP carrier costs

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OpenWays launches NFC hotel key without SWP carrier costs with a little help from Nokia and NXP which can be added to existing hotel locks

OpenWays isn’t the first time we have seen an NFC hotel key system. If you remember VingCard, an ASSA ABLOY company launched a pilot in Stockholm last year. However, the emerging mobile network operator joint ventures and associated costs to firms that want to provision secure data over networks to secure elements has become costly at best. In essence, launching an NFC based company that needs to access a secure element has had costs added that prove too expensive for many firms to turn a profit.

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Yale demos NFC door locks solutions at CES for Android, iOS and BB

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Yale demos NFC door locks solutions at CES for Android, iOS and BB

We have reported on Yale and their NFC door locks before. However, we have now seen the locks in action and have far more details about how Yale (an ASSA ABLOY company) plans to bring their solutions to market. The Yale NFC door locks are an exciting prospect because they represent quality products for access control that are built for consumers. Yes, later this year we will be able to cost effectively buy NFC door locks for our homes, offices, and anywhere else we would like to secure and use access control facilities.

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Kids going crazy for Activision Skylanders NFC game

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Kids going crazy for Activision Skylanders NFC game, shown off at CES by NXP

NFC gaming is becoming big and Activision is currently benefiting from this new craze with its Skylanders Spyro’s Adventure game that uses an NFC reader / writer and game characters that hold NFC tags. The whole concept of the game is that an evil overlord named Kaos is invading the Skylanders’ world and turned the characters into toys and banished them to Earth. Luckily, kids who own the game and portal (read USB based NFC reader/ writer) can get the characters back to the Skylanders’ home and help them defeat Kaos. There are battles, puzzles and opportunities to add strength and attributes to each character. You can also collect attributes for characters you do not own for if and when you do purchase that NFC tag based character.

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BlackBerry Tag deployed already in OS 7.1 update for NFC sharing

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BlackBerry Tag deployed already in OS 7.1 update with NFC goodness all round

You have probably heard of BlackBerry Tag and its NFC capabilities. We popped over to the Blackberry booth at CES to see Blackberry Tag in action so we could see improvements made to the way the OS deals with NFC. Although we couldn’t see how the new 7.1 OS deals with NFC tags, which was a major issue when the NFC capable BlackBerry smartphones launched, we did see its beaming or sharing features in action. We must say that BlackBerry Tag worked flawlessly in the demo we received from Annu Dawar, who is a Product Manager for Research in Motion.

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ZIK Parrot by Starck high-end NFC headphone prototype shown off at CES

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ZIK Parrot by Starck high-end NFC headphone prototype shown off at CES

Okay, the ZIK Parrot by Starck NFC headphones have been unveiled and we feel lucky enough to count ourselves among the first to see, and probably more relevantly hear them in action. Parrot contacted us before CES and told us that they had something to show us that we would be very interested to see. Turns out they weren’t just hyping. We have been in contact with Parrot for some time, and in that time the firm has hinted to us that they were indeed working on NFC speakers and NFC headphones. We knew whatever product the firm released would be high quality, but the innovation that Parrot showed off at CES surprised even us.

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Taggle social NFC retail shopping is here for consumers and retailers

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Taggles social retail apps use NFC and barcodes to create a social shopping experience all based on Amazon’s web services

Word of mouth marketing has always been the most powerful form of marketing that has ever existed. If you add to the a viral expansion loop model some NFC, a massive database of UPC product codes, some social sharing abilities and shopping you end up with Taggle. Taggle is a new shopping service that allows consumers to scan bar codes, QR codes or read NFC tags associated with retail purchases and either review them or give them a star rating. Users of the mobile apps don’t even need to sign up for an account. Once a product has been scanned, the social bit happens and users can share their buys on Facebook and Twitter.

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How to make a better NFC antenna with New rFid Concept

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How to make a better NFC antenna with New rFid Concept

You may have never heard of the New rFid Concept NFC antenna system, but you will soon want it in your NFC smartphone. If you have an NFC smartphone you will no doubt have become frustrated at one point or another with the ability to read tags easily. This is especially true if you are attempting to read NFC tags through glass or on certain materials like metals. At best most NFC antennas will only pick up a signal at around a distance of 4cm and sometimes substantially less. There has to be a better way, right? Well, there is and French firm New rFid Concept have it ready to roll with an advanced NFC antenna that substantially increases the performance of NFC smartphones.

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Aditux demos NFC payments iCarte solution and more

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Aditux demos NFC payments iCarte solution

We like covering Aditux because the firm is always up to something new. We imagine their dev labs being like that of a mad professor with projects going on all over the place. From Nokia apps, to NFC tag management and writing software, Aditux crosses industries and sectors developing innovative solutions that use NFC. We met up with the CEO of Aditux, Jayden Khakurel, to find out about their latest and greatest project that moves Aditux into the NFC payments sector, and to see what the firm had developed.

Aditux has been working with the iCarte iPhone case to develop some NFC payments software for both retailers and consumers. Obviously with Apple not including NFC in the iPhone 4S, this has given developers a great opportunity to write NFC mobile wallet apps without competing with Cupertino at this point. What we like about the Aditux wallet is the fact it isn’t reliant on the iCarte system but allows all current iOS users to conduct NFC payments now.

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Learn how to build an NFC app at NFC Bootcamp

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Learn how to build an NFC app at the NFC Bootcamp training programs from OTA training

NFC isn’t new to the world, however, it is new to developers and consumers. With the untapped potentials that are associated with NFC development, training is a massive gap required to introduce experienced developers and newbies alike to code innovative apps. Well, we said “is” but really that statement should be “was”, thanks to the NFC Bootcamp. NFC Bootcamp is traveling the US and putting on training sessions in multiple cities training devs on how to develop NFC apps.

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NXP creates NFC Android app for cultural art and tech show

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NXP creates NFC Android app for cultural art and tech show

NXP Semiconductors has teamed up with startup firm, U-Approach, and created an NFC android app that promotes cultural participation for the STRP Festival. The STRP Festival is one of Europe’s largest art and technology festivals, and this year visitors will have the ability to interact with exhibits using their NFC Android smartphone and the new app. After tapping their NFC smartphone against an exhibit, visitors can get detailed information about the exhibited artwork.

Frens Frijns, Director of the STRP Festival, commented, “As a cultural festival, we feature artistic and creative experiments with technology. We believe that the ‘Internet of Things’ is evolving into a ‘clickable world’. We are the first festival in the world to provide that experience in a way that helps people better understand the art while giving them the ability to share their own interpretation, introducing a new social dimension to art interpretation in the festival experience.”

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NFC robot project shows the future of toys

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NFC robot project shows the future of toys

We love the development community when it comes to innovative NFC based projects, and an NFC robot project by Erin the Robot Grrl could show the future of toys. The whole attraction of NFC is based on causality. If I put “this” close to “that” something happens. In that vein, the the robot hat project was born. The concept is that by placing different hats embedded with NFC tags on Erin’s BubbleBoy robot that it initiates different behaviors. We won’t spoil the cool video where you get to see the different interactions performed by BubbleBoy when he gets a new hat, but do give the video a look!

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BlackBerry Tag demoed showing off NFC sharing capabilities (Video)

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BlackBerry Tag demoed showing off NFC sharing capabilities

BlackBerry Tag is to RIM what Android Beam is to Google. BlackBerry devices started cropping up with NFC chips starting with the BlackBerry Bold 9900 and 9930 a couple of months ago. Since that point all BlackBerry devices that have been launched, with the exception of the newest Torch, have included support for NFC. The software that came along with those BlackBerry NFC phones wasn’t up to the job, as it only recognized a few NFC tag types and has given a generally poor user experience. We have to hand it to RIM for embracing NFC in its BlackBerry phones, but we wish they had refined the NFC tag reading ability more before they launched and marketed their devices as being NFC capable.

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Galaxy Nexus NFC smartphone for Verizon official with specs and videos

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Galaxy Nexus NFC smartphone for Verizon gets official with specs and videos

Finally, more details about the Galaxy Nexus are becoming available with a specification sheet and a multitude of videos. Interestingly, the Verizon Galaxy Nexus departs slightly from the version announced in Hong Kong earlier this month. The changes are subtle and revolve around a larger battery, which has no doubt been included because LTE is known to suck you dry of juice quicker than 3G. These differences also are related to the CDMA versus the HSPA+ version that Google showed off.

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Samsung Galaxy Nexus NFC phone announced for Verizon in US

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Samsung Galaxy Nexus NFC phone announced for Verizon in US

It’s official, the Samsung Galaxy Nexus has been announced and it’s an NFC phone of the hero flavor. There have been months of speculation, including false rumors and poets hinting at what the NFC Samsung Galaxy Nexus may hold in store for consumers. Now we know, and the waiting is nearly over before you have the next pure Google experience phone in your pocket. We do have to say though, that the webcast sucked. Obviously here at NFC Rumors, Near Field Communication is a key element we are interested in and tonight we learned that the mighty NFC is on board as you probably expected from Google. Not only that, but NFC is the core component of Android Beam in the Galaxy Nexus.

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Where is Google Wallet accepted? What is NFC payments experience like?

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Where is Google Wallet accepted? What is NFC payments experience like?

It’s been a month since Google launched the Google Wallet NFC mobile wallet officially. There have been a string of announcements since from Google about where the Google Wallet will be accepted, but sometimes it’s hard to keep up with all the NFC news that passes our way. So, we thought we’d let you know where Google Wallet can be used and we would also share the latest Google video that shows consumers using the Google Wallet for the first time during promotions in and around New York. We will warn you though – people have an emotional reaction to using the Google Wallet! Let’s start off with the Google Wallet video and take it from there.

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Motorola Droid RAZR render outed waiting to see if it is NFC

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Motorola drops a micro site showing the Motorola Droid RAZR render but doesn’t give any clues on NFC

Motorola released a teaser website today showing company owned renders of the Motorola Droid RAZR, but there were no clues about NFC being on board. On Friday, Motorola announced a couple of NFC headsets and we speculated that because there are currently no Motorola NFC phones that the Motorola Droid RAZR could come endowed with some NFC love.

Like a few potential NFC phones that are about at the moment, the Motorola Droid RAZR has an identity problem, which isn’t uncommon in the rumors circles. The phone has been called the Spyder, Spyder HD RAZR and now we all seem to have settled on the Motorola Droid RAZR. Motorola has now shown off its teaser site that contains images of the phone, but we still only have a few specifications that BGR said they had received which include a dual-core 1.2GHz processor, 1GB of RAM, and a 4.3-inch display of unknown resolution.

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Motorola counts down to Motorola Spyder event but is it NFC? (Video)

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Motorola counts down to Motorola Spyder event but is it NFC?

Ice Cream Sandwich season is upon us and with it comes NFC smartphone announcements by the bucket load, and we are now wondering if the rumored Motorola Spyder / Droid HD / Motorola Razr HD or whatever it is called will be joining the NFC wunderphone ranks this week. Motorola has now placed a countdown timer on its page to the Motorola launch event that we presume will announce the Motorola Spyder. Interestingly that timer runs out just 7 hours before the Samsung Galaxy Nexus Ice Cream Sandwich is due to start over in Hong Kong, which again shows a concerted effort for announcements to come back to back and an NFC Ice Cream Sandwich phone from Motorola would enable a one-two punch to hit sales of the ever popular iPhone.

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Motorola ELITE SLIVER and Motorola ELITE FLIP NFC headsets announced

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Motorola ELITE SLIVER and Motorola ELITE FLIP NFC headsets announced with Siri like capabilities ahead of Motorola event

Here’s a turn up for the books as Motorola announces its new Motorola ELITE SLIVER and Motorola ELITE FLIP NFC headsets that have iPhone like Siri voice recognition capabilities ahead of its Ice Cream Sandwich event. The question in our minds is why is Motorola launching NFC headsets when it doesn’t have NFC smartphones? I think we can all guess the answer to that one. Now we are getting excited.

“Seamless integration of elegant design and new ground-breaking technology make Motorola ELITE SLIVER and Motorola ELITE FLIP, the obvious choices for consumers from the tech savvy to the fashion conscious,” said Yossi Cohen, Senior Vice President of Companion Products at Motorola Mobility. “In designing these headsets, we built custom software to deliver new user experiences. Multiple technology advancements such as NFC, HD Audio Plus featuring wideband audio and My MotoSpeak provide an additional layer of superior and innovative functionality.”

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ThingLink Labs launches printable online interactive images with NFC tags

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ThingLink Labs launches printable online interactive images with NFC tags and a little help from UPM RFID

ThingLink have announced that you can now print online interactive image links to an NFC tag that the company calls a “Rich Media Note.”

NFC tags that link to online printable interactive images is a twist on the firm’s current service. Let us give you the history. ThingLink is a service that allows website owners to embed tags into images and then provides analytics for how those images are used within a user’s websites. The launch project for ThingLink Labs is Rich Media Notes, a printable version of ThingLink images with Near Field Communications / NFC enabled Rich Media Tags that are readable by enabled smartphones and devices.

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Nokia NFC Luna Bluetooth Headset

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Nokia NFC Luna Bluetooth Headset

Nokia released its Nokia 603 Symbian Belle NFC phone today and what would a Nokia launch be without an accessory to match, which is why Nokia also launched the Nokia NFC Luna Bluetooth Headset.

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Visa Europe to launch Visa Wallet for NFC payments in August 2012

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Visa Europe to launch Visa Wallet for NFC payments in August 2012

Visa announced that its NFC payments Visa Wallet would be coming this fall in the United States, but it now appears that Visa Europe won’t roll out its version until either August or September 2012. Steve Perry, Commercial Director for Visa Europe, confirmed the deployment of Europe’s Visa Wallet at the European security summit in Frankfurt. Details are thin on the ground at the moment about Visa’s European Visa Wallet, but Perry did share some interesting tidbits that shed light on how Visa intends to take a different approach than what might have been expected of the company when it comes to NFC payments and its Visa Wallet offering that we may well see built into the American version.

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CSI globalVCard app launches for iOS and BlackBerry, NFC to come later

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CSI globalVCard app launches with support for its business virtual credit card app on iOS and BlackBerry devices, NFC to come later

Last month CSI Enterprises launched their CSI globalVCard virtual business credit card app for Android. This month the company is adding support for iOS and BlackBerry devices while promising NFC payments capabilities in a future update. Virtual credit cards are set to become a security product that allows both businesses and consumers to protect their real banking details as they create and use virtual cards which act as smaller sub accounts that users transfer money into and then use that account exclusively in NFC mobile wallets such as Google Wallet. However, for businesses, an application like the CSI globalVCard allows them to put money on employees’ virtual cards that businesses create for trackable expenses. The CSI globalVCard app for iPhones and iPads is already available in the app store, and CSI is promising that the BlackBerry app will be available by the end of October. At this time the CSI globalVCard app is not NFC enabled and the company has stated that this will change in a future update that will add PayPass support for NFC payments.

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