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Near Field Communication and all contactless technology

NFC Times Exclusive Insight – Deutsche Telekom, one of the most important backers of SIM-based NFC through the years, now questions whether the technology could ever become a standard, as it quietly withdrew its little-used SIM-based NFC mobile wallet from the German market last week after more than two years.

NFC Times Exclusive – Vodafone Group’s proxy-card NFC mobile-payments offer, which is designed to enable subscribers to add their credit and debit cards to their Vodafone Wallets as funding accounts linked to a Vodafone prepaid card stored on the SIM, has yet to be launched by any major Vodafone branch operator in Europe.

NFC Times Exclusive: Slovakia’s largest mobile operator, Slovak Telekom, plans to follow its parent, Germany-based Deutsche Telekom, in launching NFC payments using a prepaid application issued by Deutsche Telekom’s ClickandBuy online payments unit, NFC Times has learned. 

NFC Times Exclusive: Vodafone Group today announced the launch of an NFC mobile-wallet and payments service in Spain and timetables for similar launches in four other European countries–all featuring Vodafone’s own co-branded prepaid payment application, SmartPass.

A number of mobile operators in Europe and beyond are planning to introduce their own NFC-enabled payment services starting in 2013, as the telcos begin to roll out their NFC mobile wallets.

Vodafone is the first mobile operator in Australia to disclose plans for a commercial NFC payment launch, though it has not announced a target date for when it plans to launch the service.

Vendors announced Monday they are supplying UK-based Vodafone Group with trusted service management services and mobile-wallet software, respectively, as the UK-based telco gears up for NFC commercial launches.

Vodafone sees its planned prepaid payment service in its forthcoming NFC mobile wallets as a “business opportunity,” though it intends to enable many other applications, including payment from major banks, Christian Wirtz, group director for mCommerce told NFC Times.