Program Brief

NFC Forum Retail Special Interest Group 1 © 2013 NFC Forum

NFC Forum Special Interest Groups

Advancing NFC in Retail

The NFC Forum was formed to advance the use of Near Field Communication technology by developing specifications, ensuring interoperability among devices and services, and educating the market about NFC technology. This mission drives efforts to provide programs that create a highly stable framework for extensive application development, seamless interoperable solutions, and security for NFC-enabled transactions. This foundation provides an ideal environment for experts in the Near Field Communication ecosystem to collaborate on solutions across the business and technical needs of their industries and to develop NFC programs to support them.

NFC technology opens up possibilities that are limited only by the imagination in payment and non-payment applications across every business sector. Non-payment NFC applications have the potential to revolutionize our daily lives by creating new ways of carrying out tasks, accessing information, and interacting with people and organizations.

As part of continuing efforts to foster broad understanding and adoption of NFC technology, the NFC Forum Special Interest Group (SIG) initiative allows us to share our expertise across key vertical market sectors. The SIGs support the NFC Forum’s objective to create opportunities and enable members to take an active role in driving NFC solution development and deployment.

Accessing NFC Technology A short-range wireless communication technology, NFC makes life easier and more convenient for consumers around the world by making it simpler to perform transactions, exchange digital content, and connect electronic devices with a touch.

The robust NFC Forum technical specifications unlock the full capabilities of NFC technology, which includes three modes of operation:

• Peer-to-peer mode enables two NFC devices to communicate with each other to exchange information and share files, so that users of NFC-enabled devices can quickly share contact information and other files with a touch

• Reader/writer mode enables NFC devices to read information stored on inexpensive NFC tags embedded in smart posters, displays, and product packaging, providing a great marketing tool for companies

• Card emulation mode enables NFC devices to act like smart cards, allowing users to perform transactions such as retail purchases and transit access with just a touch.

The N-Mark enables people to easily identify NFC-enabled devices and touch points, providing simple and nearly effortless access to the full power, ease, and convenience of NFC solutions.

Importance of NFC for the Retail Sector The combination of NFC-enabled devices and inexpensive NFC tags integrated into smart posters, at point of purchase, out-of-home displays, direct mail, printed media, shelf labels, and on product packaging enables direct and enhanced mobile NFC interaction among retailers, brand owners, and consumers. Near Field Communication technology enables a frictionless consumer experience that is substantially faster, easier, and more authentic than other mobile and digital interactive technologies.

Consumer-facing applications include increased product insight at point of sale and point of use, real-time personalized offers, and integration with loyalty program offerings. For retailers and brand owners, NFC-enabled interaction can lead to more effective deployment of advertising and marketing activities to build consumer engagement thus resulting in increased sales conversions and brand loyalty. This ability to

Program Brief

NFC Forum Retail Special Interest Group 2 © 2013 NFC Forum

effectively engage shoppers in the store will substantially benefit retailers as they seek to increase in-store consumer involvement and impulse purchases.

Retail NFC opportunities are attractive across a broad ecosystem that includes mobile network operators, handset providers, Internet service providers, data analytics service providers, retail software providers and system integrators, packaging printers and suppliers, marketing and advertising agencies, and innovative start-up organizations.

How the NFC Forum Retail SIG Can Collaborate with You The NFC Forum Special Interest Group for Retail is working with retail stakeholders and technology providers to determine the best direction across the sector. Market requirements are presented to NFC technology providers for future development. Additionally, companies creating consumer retail NFC solutions are informed in detail about current possibilities to implement NFC solutions. Our intention is to foster future-safe retail solutions built on the NFC platform that protect investments across the eco-system. An example of work currently underway is the effort between GS1 and the NFC Forum to enable cross-education, marketing, and joint initiatives.

Promoting use of the N-Mark to enable a consistent user experience is a key element. The NFC Forum Retail SIG is working to identify and utilize synergies among the vertical sectors of the NFC ecosystem: for example, Retail plays a role in Payments, Consumer Electronics, and Health Care applications as well. The Retail SIG will coordinate communication between stakeholders and organizations in order to collect emerging requirements related to Retail and pass them on to the NFC Forum, as technology's continuing evolution may trigger new specification work. Commercial companies and non-profit organizations are both invited to contribute as NFC Forum members to the efforts of the Retail SIG.

Additional Information A range of materials and documentation is available to support the adoption and deployment of NFC technology. These materials include detailed NFC Forum brand guidelines documentation, specifications, and interoperability guidelines, and they are available on the NFC Forum website.

NFC Forum Membership NFC Forum Members can join individual SIGs for greater participation across the NFC ecosystem and for opportunities within the vertical segments that have key priority for their businesses. We invite you to become an NFC Forum Member and to help accelerate the delivery of exciting new NFC solutions to consumers and businesses. Membership levels accommodate companies across a wide range of industries at different phases in NFC solution development. For more information on becoming an NFC Forum Member, visit the How to Join page on our website.

About the NFC Forum The NFC Forum was launched as a non-profit industry association in 2004 by leading mobile communications, semiconductor, and consumer electronics companies. The Forum’s mission is to advance the use of Near Field Communication technology by developing specifications, ensuring interoperability among devices and services, and educating the market about NFC technology. The Forum’s 180 global member companies currently are developing specifications for a modular NFC device architecture, and protocols for interoperable data exchange and device-independent service delivery, device discovery, and device capability. The NFC Forum’s Sponsor members, which hold seats on the Board of Directors, include leading players in key industries around the world. These Sponsor members are: Broadcom Corporation, Google, Inc., Intel, MasterCard Worldwide, NEC, Nokia, NXP Semiconductors, Qualcomm, Renesas Electronics Corporation, Samsung, Sony Corporation, STMicroelectronics, and Visa Inc. For more information visit www.nfc-forum.org.