500M NFC phones to hit market by end of next year
Though there are plenty of NFC skeptics, one thing's for sure: If the technology doesn't take off it won't be for lack of consumer access. According to ABI Research, more than 500 million NFC-enabled devices will be in use by consumers worldwide by the end of next year. That's up from 285 million NFC phones shipping this year.
"NFC has reached the point of no return," said John Devlin, practice director. "It all hinged on handsets; and next year we will see half a billion devices in the hands of consumers as [NFC] becomes more widely integrated. Up until this point banks and other service partners were holding back from committing to [mobile network operators] and it has always surprised me that they did not drive this forward themselves and invest to take charge of this market’s potential."
According to ABI, handset manufacturers have continued to provide NFC-enabled phones while the carriers pushed payments, a proposition that not seen significant adoption. Now those same equipment mkaers are delivering new services and features using the technology.
At this point every major handset manufacturer except for Apple is shipping products with NFC capabilities.
"Put simply, the OEMs have innovated and made use of the simple abilities that NFC offers to increase interaction of people, devices, and their immediate environment. This is not just in mobile — tablets, PCs and peripherals, speaker docks, televisions, cameras, gaming and domestic appliances are all increasingly incorporating NFC," Devlin said.
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