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France-based chip supplier Inside Secure today reported a sharp decline in its revenue in the first quarter from its NFC chips, blaming the situation on excess inventories of NFC chips on hand by its main customer BlackBerry.

France-based NFC chip supplier Inside Secure said it would cut up to 20% of its global workforce following the loss of more than $30 million in 2012.

Research In Motion has unveiled its new NFC-enabled BlackBerry 10 operating system and the first two devices running the software, along with a new corporate name.

U.S.-based Qualcomm, the world’s largest supplier of processor chips to smartphone makers, has entered the NFC market–a move that could substantially expand the availability of NFC-enabled smartphones.

France-based chip supplier Inside Secure announced today it has completed its acquisition of the AuthenTec Embedded Security Solutions unit for $41.6 million in cash.

France-based chip supplier Inside Secure has agreed to acquire the Embedded Security Solutions unit of U.S.-based AuthenTec, which designs software and hardware products used for digital rights management, virtual private networks and other network security.

Google has chosen U.S.-based Broadcom as its NFC chip supplier for its new Nexus 4 smartphone and Nexus 10 tablet and has incorporated Broadcom’s NFC software stack in its new Android 4.2 operating system running on the devices.

PARIS, France – Smart card vendor association Eurosmart estimates the industry will have shipped nearly 100 million NFC-enabled SIM cards and embedded secure elements by the end of 2012–a figure it projects will double in 2013.

NFC technology companies have promoted the idea of using NFC tags to foil counterfeiters of luxury goods for some time.

NFC chip supplier Inside Secure has introduced its first embedded secure element, a key product that it hopes will help it stay competitive with much larger rivals.