Tag: apple nfc technology

A group of banks in Australia have accused the iPhone maker of delaying the progress of mobile payments.

A number of Australian banks have come together in a claim that Apple NFC technology restrictions are keeping mobile payments from progressing. They feel that mobile wallet services could be advancing faster across multiple platforms, but the iPhone maker’s tech restrictions are proving to be highly problematic.

The banks have said they feel that lifting the NFC restriction considerably change the ecosystem.

The group of Australian banks described the struggle they feel with the Apple NFC technology restriction in a submission to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission(ACCC). The submission was 27 pages long and described the way the NFC restriction is not only stopping new mobile wallets from being accessible across different platforms, but it is also placing a barrier in the way of progress.

The four banks insist that the restriction is leading to a fragmented customer experience and that if access is not made available there “simply will not be the same incentives and ability to innovative,” when it comes to progress on iOS based devices or others, for that matter.

The restriction from Apple NFC technology is important in Australia as it represents 40% of smartphones.

In the report from the banks, they pointed out that “approximately 40% of smartphone sales are iPhones,” in the country. That said, they also underscored that “the value and importance of the iPhone customer segment for app uptake, use and expenditure far outweigh this share.”

To illustrate the point, the report said that about 60 percent of mobile banking transactions come from iPhone users. Moreover 70 percent of Australian mobile app revenues come from those same devices. As Apple smartphone users are more likely to use mobile wallets and banking and will more readily embrace newer technologies, these are also the users most likely to push tech innovation, such as with mobile payments.

By restricting the Apple NFC technology, the banks claim that progress in other areas of mobile payments is being hobbled. iPhone users are typically more tech focused, wealthy, engaged by and attached to their devices. By cutting them off from tech other than that produced by the iPhone maker itself, competition and opportunity from elsewhere is stunted, said the report.

The latest smartphones from the company finally have near field communication tech, but its uses are limited.

For several releases, the tech universe had been expecting Apple smartphones to include NFC technology, but now that the iPhone 6 has arrived, and it does finally enabled with near field communication, it is being discovered that its uses are exceptionally limited compared to rival devices.

The near field communication technology will be compatible exclusively with Apple Pay.

At the same time that the devices were unveiled, so was the mobile payments service called Apple Pay, which uses NFC technology, also received its first moments in the spotlight. This allows the iPhone to be used in place of a credit or debit card at one of the many places across the country that accept this type of transaction. All that would be required to use the mobile device in this way is to tap it against an NFC-equipped terminal and then use the fingerprint sensor through Touch ID to verify identity and confirm the payment.

However, while other devices use NFC technology for a range of capabilities, this is not the case with the iPhone.

It looks as though Apple is continuing to hold back its use of certain forms of technology that are already becoming rather commonplace in the mobile tech market. For a few years now, other NFC enabled mobile devices have been used for pairing devices, exchanging contacts between smartphones, or even sharing photos and other media files. Tags located in public places such as in shops give consumers the ability to tap their devices and receive information about products or obtain discount coupons that can be redeemed at the checkout counter with another simple tap.

Many of these tasks can be accomplished with other forms of short range communication tech, such as Bluetooth – such as pairing devices, for example, as is the case with the upcoming Apple Watch – but Apple has opted to restrict the use of NFC technology in its devices, at least for now, exclusively to its payments service. This move is reminiscent of the release of Touch ID last year, at which time people had come up with all sorts of potential uses for the way that the fingerprint sensor could be used, only to discover that it was meant only for unlocking the device and conducting a small number of tasks.