KDDI Soon to Sell NFC Services
- End January 2012, the mobile operator KDDI will be initiating commercial launches of its contactless services. Among these: card and mobile payment, couponing, loyalty, ticketing, P2P transactions, etc. –most of these services should be launched by spring 2012.
- KDDI relies on several partners to carry this initiative through: including Japan Airlines, as well as issuers, loyalty and couponing specialists, gift cards manufacturers and smart posters designers, retailers and culture-related services providers (promotional campaigns using smart posters).
- The digital money specialist Seven Card Service, will be proposing an NFC version of Nanaco (a prepaid top-up card), already very popular with those using NTT DoCoMo’s m-wallet, Osaifu-Keitai.
- Selected providers include: Gemalto (TSM, SIM cards and services), Dai Nippon Printing (provisioning), Toppan Printing (NFC payment and loyalty) and even MasterCard (PayPass compliance).
- These services will first concern Samsung Galaxy S II owners but should also be made available for other Smartphones very soon.
- KDDI is the first Japanese mobe to invest in large scale commercial launch of NFC services.
- Its main rivals (NTT DoCoMo and Softbank) should soon propose likewise solutions: as illustrated by the constitution of a dedicated Joint Venture (the Japan Mobile NFC Consortium) end December 2011 to work on especially crafted standards as well as on the adoption of contactless solutions in Japan (see "Japanese Telcos on NFC").