Dutch bank Rabobank has launched an NFC-enabled mobile wallet, storing a debit application on embedded secure elements in two older Samsung Android devices, which the bank claims is the first NFC mobile payments launch in the country.
With the commercial launch of the Rabo Wallet, Rabobank, which five years ago was one of the key organizers of a now-defunct telco-bank joint venture in the Netherlands dubbed “Sixpack,” is bypassing telco SIM cards to roll out NFC payments.
But Rabobank has to make do with only two Samsung devices, both released in 2013. Newer Galaxy devices on the market, including most units of Samsung’s current flagship smartphone, the Galaxy S5, do not come with embedded chips.