Google NFC software engineers are playing up tag-reading and peer-to-peer apps for Android, while apparently stalling on delivering application-programming interfaces, or APIs, for such applications as payment, which use card emulation.
Google NFC software engineers, while touting the ‘dozens’ of NFC phones in the pipeline and prospects for compelling applications using tag reading and peer-to-peer communication, downplayed use of Android phones for payment with secure chips.
Two top Google NFC developers, Nick Pelly and Jeff Hamilton, speaking at the Google I/O conference yesterday in San Francisco, told Android developers attending a session on NFC not to expect application-programming interfaces, or APIs, to access the secure element on Google’s Nexus S or other Android NFC phones anytime soon – reports Dan Balaban.
Pelly, who led the presentation, ‘How to NFC,’ and who appears to be a technical lead for NFC at Google, said Google has yet to introduce any APIs for card emulation because the company can’t yet ensure a ‘compelling’ user experience when consumers tap their phones to pay using an application stored on a secure chip. He and Hamilton said there probably won’t be any APIs in the near future available to developers in software development kits.
If true, this could potentially delay the introduction of applications that would enable Android NFC phones to be used in card-emulation mode, that is, acting like contactless debit or credit cards, transit tickets or door keys. But some industry experts are casting doubt on Google’s reluctance to support card emulation in Android phones.
After all, Google ordered the Nexus S with embedded secure chips, the PN65 from NXP Semiconductors, which can store applications. The NFC controllers in the phones also support applications for card emulation on SIM cards.
And there is little doubt that Google is developing an NFC mobile wallet to store payment and is building an m-commerce infrastructure that could deliver advertisements and targeted offers to consumers in and around the physical retail POS. A key piece of this m-commerce initiative is payment, for which Google would work with banks and established payment networks. Sources have said that among these are US-based Citigroup and MasterCard Worldwide.
