ContactlessNews | Ingenico, MasterCard bring contactless ticketing to Turkey

Wednesday, December 7, 2011

Ingenico announced the launch of a new conactless card payment system for public transportation in Eskisehir, Turkey.

Based on MasterCard’s M/Chip Advance technology, the new system will allow riders on Eskisehir’s buses and tramways to pay for fares with the tap of a contactless “Esparacard” card.

Ingenico designed and supplied both the point-of-sales hardware and software payment solutions for the Esparacard project. Other partners include Garanti Bankasi, Eskisehir Metropolitan Municipality, MasterCard, Asis and ILFER companies.

According to Ingenico, the company’s POS equipment was specially modified to recognize unique and personal cardholder information embedded on the Esparacard. For example, the reader can automatically tell whether a rider qualifies for a student, or a teacher, or senior fare discount with a single swipe.

The prepaid Esparacard contains both contact and contactless features, and is a part of MasterCard M/Chip Advance worldwide’s new payment platform for transportation.

The Esparacard system is also integrated with the banking infrastructure to allow the use of credit cards from all banks, according to Yilmaz Büyükersen, mayor of Eskisehir.

Azerbaijan excited for new contactless and mobile payments

MasterCard’s PayPass contactless payment feature may soon be presented to the Azerbaijan market of cashless payments.

According to a recent MasterCard study, 75% of the local residents said they would like to use contactless payment cards in supermarkets and 60% to pay public transport fare. When asked which devices, in addition to a plastic card, it would be convenient to make payments, 86% of respondents said they would like to use their mobile phone.

NXP leads the contactless ticketing market, according to ABI Research

In ABI Research’s newest market study analysis, NXP Semiconductors has reportedly claimed the top spot in the contactless ticketing market with 74% of the market share.

Vantiv picks Ingenico for EMV, NFC readers

Vantiv is now offering Ingenico’s NFC and EMV-enabled Telium series point-of-sale products to its financial institutions and merchant customers in the U.S.

The Telium readers, which are equipped with Vantiv’s own point-to-point card data encryption solution (P2PE), will help the Vantiv’s U.S. clients make the jump to EMV chip-based and NFC mobile payments, according to the company.

Turkcell launches NFC-enabled handset from ZTE

Chinese handset manufacturer ZTE has partnered with Turkcell, Turkey’s largest mobile operator, to offer a new SIM-based NFC mobile device for the Turkish market.

The Turkcell T11 handset (aka the ZTE Racer II) can be used to pay for both highway toll payments and items at the point of sale with a simple tap against a contactless reader.

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