Russia’s i-Free Launches NFC Wallet

By PYMNTS | May 30, 2013

Russia’s i-Free has announced that it will release the first NFC wallet in CIS embedded smartphones, and TSM platforms that will allow users to use mobile contactless technology and download MobileMasterCard PayPass cards, reports Finextra. I-Free presented three new services that customers can use for the NFC wallet, namely MobileMaserCard PayPass payment cards, transport cards from various Russian regional centers and a geolocation-based voucher service. Currently these services are only offered to a small number of customers in Russia, however will soon be available for commercial use.

Anatoly Makeshin, a member of Tinkoff Credit Systems bank, said, “We aim to offer to our clients the most advanced and hi-tech products. To us, the no-branches bank, the most convenient way of delivery of a payment instrument right to the client’s hand has always been of paramount importance. This solution combines both high usability and speed: it takes few minutes to get a card into a smartphone. This is a breakthrough, one more confident step into future payments.”