I’ve heard it said that the shorter one’s title, the more important one is. If true, it doesn’t bode well for Spencer White, Director of Mobile Financial Services and Business Development, Cingular Wireless. Nevertheless, the fact that “The New AT&T” supports a Director-level position focused on this space is another indication of their leadership in the mobile commerce arena.
In fact, listening to Spencer’s comments, one might get the impression that Cingular/AT&T is the only carrier taking substantive steps toward making mobile payments a reality. Like many during the day, his comments were largely centered around NFC. Among the tidbits dropped during his presentation:
Cingular is currently running retail in-store trials involving smart tags and NFC phones for marketing purposes.
The company is working out a solution for international peer-to-peer funds transfer initiated from mobile devices.
Cingular/AT&T will introduce their first NFC-equipped phones late in 2007, but expects the complete churn out of subscriber devices to take 5+ years. The secure element for mobile commerce will reside on the SIM.
Cingular expects to begin selling mobile banner advertising soon.
Finally, Spencer was the first of a few on the day to refer to the following statistics…
Average time to complete a cash transation at retail POS = 30+ seconds. Average time for mag. stripe credit/debit card transaction = 22 seconds. Average time to complete contactless transaction = 12.5 seconds. Even if true, it remains to be seen if merchants will find this time savings compelling. For more, read “Three Presenters…” below.
Once illiterate, Brad Grau eventually mastered QWERTY and spellcheck although XML continues to elude him. He works in the wireless industry in a nondescript midwestern city. He is a keen observer of wireless progress and enjoys innovating daily and talking about himself in the third person.