Reports that Apple could include near-field communication tags in its next iPhone, allowing people to transfer data – and probably iTunes payments – to and from their phones, have got tech watchers very excited indeed.
It’s a big deal, no question. Combining touch payments with Apple’s vast database of credit-card details could instantly put NFC at a tipping point. It could potentially turn Apple’s iPhone into a credit card, keyring, travel pass and movie ticket in one fell swoop. Google is also backing the technology, putting it in both its latest Nexus S phone and in stickers for bars and restaurants to advertise Google Places.
But part of the reason for the fuss is that tech reporters have plenty of pent-up up excitement about NFC that the Apple news has just released.
2004 calling: Nokia 3220
Apparently taking its cues direct from Bill Gates’ adage that the impact of a technology is overstated in the short term but underestimated further out, NFC has been a very slow burn. I first wrote about it in 2004, when Nokia triumphantly announced a NFC shell for its 3220 phone.
That wasn’t a smartphone, though, and it is the opportunity for third-party developers to tap into a device’s NFC capabilities that could see the US and Europe go the way of Japan, where paying through your phone is already widely popular.
Android 2.3 includes an NFC software stack for developers to play with, and Google promises more advanced capabilities in the future. Google Checkout doesn’t have anything like the scale of iTunes, so the API creates a big open goal for PayPal, Ebay’s payment service.
Meanwhile, big payment firms, mobile operators and retailers are already taking the technology seriously.
Last August, VisaEurope launched a payments service for mobiles via a microSD card from DeviceFidelity, a specially equipped memory card that would fit into many recent phones. That would help to retrofit NFC into existing handsets.
From this summer, McDonald’s in the UK will have the terminals required to “pay by wave” via properly equipped credit and debit cards in 1,200 restaurants.
And in the US, T-Mobile, AT&T and Verizon Wireless have teamed up to create Isis, a mobile commerce network slated for launch next year.
The stars certainly seem to be aligning for NFC, at long last. One analyst group, Juniper Research, recently predicted that NFC could be in use in one in six devices globally by 2014.
The timing of Apple’s adoption of 3G and 4G shows that it can sometimes wait to include a technology in the iPhone just before it goes mass-market, rather than create a new market itself, as it did with apps.
Bloomberg’s original reporting of the iPhone story cites an analyst who cites “engineers who are working on hardware for the Apple project”. NFC World provides supporting evidence from several recent patent applications by Apple.
If NFC does make it into the next iPhone, it raises a branding question that’s been on my mind for some time – can you really still call it iTunes when it’s used to buy not just music but movies, apps and now, perhaps, anything?
