Wave Systems Corp. (fka WAVXQ)

[cliffdweller]

Orange, T-Mobile Team on Mobile Payment Service

http://www.billingworld.com/news/2011/01/orange-t-mobile-team-on-mobile-payment-service.aspx

January 31, 2011

Everything Everywhere – the union of U.K. mobile service providers Orange and T-Mobile -- will have a payment-enabled phone available by summer through a partnership with Barclaycard.

The service will be the first commercial contactless mobile payment service in the U.K., the carriers said.

Barclaycard and Everything Everywhere will roll out a service-enabled handset in the second quarter of the year. The phones will use a SIM-enabled approach to allow people to use their mobile phones to make payments of up to £15 at more than 40,000 stores in the U.K.

The SIM-based payment system uses technology called Near Field Communication (NFC) to allow people to make payments by swiping their mobile phones across a point-of-sale card reader to register the transaction. NFC can transmit and receive information at a distance of up to four inches. A report published in Bloomberg Wednesday claims that the next versions of Apple’s iPad and iPhone will also feature this technology.

Barclaycard and Everything Everywhere have been planning to create a mobile payments service in the U.K. since 2009. Barclaycard already has an Orange-branded credit card and plan to introduce an Orange Cash prepaid payment card.

Mobile payments are being touted as the next wave in how people make purchases, and the SIM-enabled approach is not the only one being used. People also can use their phones to send a payment request via a text message and have the money taken out of their phone bill or an online payment system.

While the idea and technology for a mobile payment service has been around for awhile, 2011 is the year it’s expected to take off. There is a lot of interest in the service especially in Europe and Asia, but if the iPhone/iPad rumors are true, it will soon hit the U.S. market in a big way as well.

cliff