Near-Field communications (NFC)

I recently came across DoCoMo introducing phones in Japan that doubled up as wallets or smart cards. This allowed people using transit systems to simply wave at the bus/train and get in, or someone waving their phone at the check-out counter of a grocery store to complete their purchase.

Today, I came across an article on InformationWeek talking about Near-Field communications (NFC) as the next big thing. NFC is a short-range wireless technology operating in the unregulated RF band of 13.56 MHz. I probed further and thought I had share what I found. Below are excerpts and pointers to some references.

Dated back from 2003, here is an excerpt from Sony's press release:

NFC IP-1 is a Near Field Communication technology, which utilizes the 13.56 MHz wavelength, and is composed of a physical layer and data link layer. When devices with an NFCIP-1 compatible chip are brought into proximity, they will be able to recognize each other within a certain range*1, and can exchange information. NFC IP-1 provides a new, highly intuitive method where simply bringing devices into proximity allows them to directly recognize each other and communicate. This is in contrast to previous methods where devices have identified by screen icons on computer screens or selected within wireless networks like Bluetooth and Wireless LAN. Data exchange will take place at speeds of 106kbps, 212kbps or 424kbps. It is also possible to transfer to other communications protocols with higher speeds, once devices have been connected by NFC.

While Bluetooth, IR and the upcoming UWB are sure contenders for the PAN space, NFC is being seen as complementing rather than stepping on these technologies. An interesting read here.

Also, here is a white-paper (PDF) from ECMA International detailing NFC and show-casing its utility.

NFC forum has more details on the technology, working groups and news.

What is also hot is the NFC RFID marriage. Below is an excerpt:

The goal of NFC RFID is to provide a low-cost short-range form of wireless communications to enable consumers to use the NFC chip built in to their mobile phones and other devices to make electronics payments for various purchases or to use devices with built-in NFC readers to read information stored in NFC-tagged objects. Nokia, for example, already sells an NFC-enabled mobile phone, and other phone and electronics vendors are expected to follow suit with their own NFC-enabled products (see Developing RFID-Enabled Phones).

For additional reference, here are some articles talking about NFC

* Wi-fiplanet.com
* ABI Research
* Nokia's piece of the NFC pie