The new Telefónica Digital business unit has reached an agreement with security technology company Giesecke & Devrient to establish a single European-wide platform for Near Field Communication services. It means that G&D will take care of the ‘Trusted Service Manager’ technology and will also be one of the suppliers of NFC-enabled SIM cards.
Telefonica says it’ll introduce new NFC-based ‘mobile wallet’ services in Europe over the next few months; the O2 Money brand is expected to be used for these services in the UK.
Joaquín Mata, Global Head of Financial Services at Telefónica Digital, said “The final goal for Telefónica is to build an open NFC ecosystem ensuring interoperability and offering service providers a friendly environment to deliver NFC services reaching a large number of mobile subscribers. Giesecke & Devrient is one of Telefónica’s strategic partners in building this new ecosystem and has the required technological know-how to turn NFC services in a commercial reality.”