Just how prevalent are NFC-enabled mobile devices becoming? The latest numbers from Berg Insight reveal that thirty million handsets equipped with Near Field Communications technology were shipped last year.
What’s more, global sales of handsets featuring NFC increased ten-fold over the previous twelve months.
As a result of the past and projected growth in the near future, Berg believes that shipments will reach 700 million units by the end of 2016.
The global rise in smartphone adoption is also driving higher attach rates for other wireless connectivity technologies in handsets including GPS, Bluetooth and WLAN.
“”Even though it will take some time before the stakeholders agree on business models for payment networks, other use cases such as reading tags and easy pairing of devices may well be compelling enough for handset vendors to integrate NFC in mid- and high-end devices already today,” said André Malm, Senior Analyst, Berg Insight.
The NFC technology for short-range wireless point-to-point communication reached a “breakthrough in 2011” when several leading handset vendors released more than 40 NFC-enabled handsets, Berg Insight reveals in the new report.
To learn more about the study and its findings, click here.