MasterCard has announced US availability of a token platform that enables card issuers to store tokenized versions of their customers’ card details on Apple’s new NFC devices as well as NFC phones and tablets from a range of other manufacturers... More
UPDATED The new iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus will include support for NFC, Apple has announced. The NFC functionality will let users make Apple Pay mobile payments in stores. More
Merchant Customer Exchange (MCX), the mobile payments venture co-owned by US retail chains with collective revenues of more than US$1 trillion annually, has announced that its payments, loyalty and offers platform is to be called CurrentC — and provided the first details of how the service will work when it rolls out to 110,000 merchant locations across the US in 2015... More
Publisher IPC Media is using Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons installed in 740 One Stop convenience stores across the UK to offer discounted copies of its Chat, Pick Me Up, Woman and TV & Satellite Week magazines... More
Mobile POS provider Square is to introduce a new card reader that can be used to process both EMV chip card and magnetic stripe card payments... More
American Express is working with Croatia’s Privredna Banka Zagreb (PBZ), part of the Italy-based Intesa Sanpaolo banking group, to pilot an NFC payments service that makes use of host card emulation (HCE) technology... More
Pepsi has tested a new NFC shopper marketing solution developed by logistics optimisation solutions provider Rehrig Pacific that uses NFC chips and QR codes on display trays to “increase the opportunity for consumer interaction, at the point of sale, without increased merchandising or delivery costs”... More
One million free juices and smoothies have been given out free of charge by Jamba Juice to Isis NFC mobile wallet users since the ‘Million Free Juice or Smoothie Giveaway’ promotion launched in October 2013... More
Upmarket UK supermarket chain Waitrose has shown off a proof-of-concept mobile shopping service, based on Ensygnia’s Onescan technology, that “allows customers to complete a payment in-store using a mobile phone app, completing a purchase direct from any iPad screen in the store, without the need to head to the till point”... More
Westpac has begun a host card emulation (HCE) pilot in New Zealand, enabling customers’ credit and debit card details to be securely stored in the cloud and then used at the point of sale to make mobile payments on their Android NFC device... More
UK payments technology specialist Consult Hyperion has unveiled a proof-of-concept solution that uses Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) and host card emulation (HCE) to enable both iPhone and Android NFC phone owners to make MasterCard, Visa and other open loop EMV payments at the point of sale... More
German customers of mobile network operator Base, part of the E-Plus group, can now make payments, store membership cards and redeem coupons with their NFC phone... More
Greece’s Alpha Bank has officially launched its Tap n Pay NFC mobile payment service... More
CUA, Australia’s largest customer-owned financial institution, has become the first in the Asia Pacific region to launch an NFC payments service that makes use of host card emulation (HCE) technology... More
Synchrony Financial, formerly GE Capital Retail Finance, has made “a strategic investment” in LoopPay, developer of a mobile phone add-on that lets US consumers make payments at merchants equipped with magnetic stripe card terminals... More
Spanish bank Bankia has launched a mobile payments service that uses NFC stickers attached to the back of a customer’s smartphone to make purchases at any contactless POS terminal... More
Seamless has signed up US-based prepaid card provider InComm and the Belgian arm of POS terminal provider Ingenico as partners for its Seqr mobile payment solution... More
CaixaBank has become the first in Europe to launch a Visa-branded wristband that allows users to make contactless payments at locations equipped with a contactless POS terminal... More
Twenty bars and restaurants in New York are using a new service that combines mobile payments with social networking, enabling customers to pay their tab, meet up and communicate with friends and send ‘Goodies’ like drinks and food to their contacts... More
Supermarket giant Carrefour and convenience store group Nisa are piloting a new technology that uses Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE) beacons attached to trolleys and baskets to track a shopper’s journey around the store... More