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Near Field Communication and all contactless technology

France-based Gemalto is forecasting double-digit growth in revenue this year, following a strong 2012, in which it reported gains in both sales and profit and the first significant returns for its trusted service management business.

Smart card and security company Gemalto this week joined the CAC 40 index in Paris, which counts as members such blue-chip French companies as Total, BNP Paribas, Carrefour and Airbus jet maker EADS.

Globe Telecom of the Philippines is planning to expand its GCash funds-transfer and bill-payment service to the physical point of sale, and has launched a project that puts a closed-loop GCash payment application onto microSD cards.

Smart card and ID security company Morpho hopes to increase its EMV bank card business, as well as expand its trusted service management unit, with its acquisition of the European personalization and card manufacturing operations of American Banknote Corp.

U.S.-based startup Sequent has acquired what appears to be the remaining operational assets of former contactless reader and NFC software vendor Vivotech, purchasing Vivotech’s software unit.

France-based Morpho is advancing a proposal through its newly acquired TSM unit, Cassis International, that would attempt to set up a global NFC service roaming network.

Smart card and ID security company Morpho has signed an agreement to acquire Singapore-based trusted service manager Cassis International, putting another major TSM platform into the hands of a smart card supplier, NFC Times has learned.

Smart card association Eurosmart forecasts that vendors will ship 80 million to 120 million secure elements in 2012, as chip and card vendors begin their first significant shipments of NFC-enabled SIMs and embedded secure elements for NFC phones.