Silicon Valley-based ViVOtech, the leader in Near Field Communication (NFC) and contactless payment systems, announced that its Trusted Services Manager (TSM) and Over-The-Air (OTA) provisioning platform and NFC mobile payment wallet software will be used by Teletech Middle East in the first NFC Add-On mobile payment service in the Middle East scheduled to commence before the end of 2010. Teletech Middle East, a UAE based Services Provider Company, currently works with du telecom and other regional mobile operators on value added services. It also renders multiple services and solutions for most banks in the Middle East. It will now provide TSM services for selected partner banks along with du telecom in UAE. The service will allow participating bank cardholders to download credit, debit, and prepaid cards securely over the air to existing Smartphone handsets, including multiple BlackBerry and iPhone 3G, 3Gs, and 4G models which will be enabled with NFC add-on devices like micro SD card's or smart sleeves. Once the handset has been personalized, customers will be able to make payments using their Smartphone's at multiple contactless enabled merchant locations in the United Arab Emirates and other countries in the GCC region.
ViVOtech technology was chosen to facilitate every step of this service:
ViVOtech Issuing Server(s) residing at Teletech Middle East will enable secure Over-The-Air (OTA) provisioning of payment cards, loyalty cards and coupons to NFC add-on devices on mobile handsets A ViVOtech Control Server will enable Trusted Service Manager (TSM) functionality and the provisioning of cards and coupons into mobile handsets ViVOwallet mobile wallet software will enable the Smartphones
"We are delighted to be the end-to-end technology provider of this first NFC mobile payment commercialisation in the Middle East region," said Michael Mullagh, CEO of ViVOtech. "With this initiative, Teletech ME is laying the foundation to empower consumers in the UAE and beyond with the most innovative and contemporary method for doing transactions using their mobile handsets."
"In today's world, everyone is always looking towards new technologies that can discover the next big thing to provide better customer experience. This partnership is an important element to extend NFC technology into new markets in the Middle East, across a broad range of payment products covering from cards to mobile phones," said Niranj Sangal, CEO Teletech Middle East.
To date, ViVOtech has enabled more than 30 NFC phone field pilots globally. ViVOtech's NFC mobile payments, coupons/promotions, Over-The-Air (OTA) provisioning infrastructure software, transaction management software, NFC smart posters and contactless terminals are part of the company's end-to-end solutions that complement and complete mobile e-commerce networks and their ecosystems.
