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Nokia launches NFC Hub to sell you NFC enabled marketing materials; business cards cost $18 each!

Categories: Nokia
By: , IntoMobile
Wednesday, July 27th, 2011 at 4:56 AM
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Finnish handset maker Nokia recently launched a new online store dubbed the “NFC Hub” where companies can purchase NFC enabled marketing materials ranging from posters, to business cards, and even stickers, in an aim to get people to interact with their brand or business in a new, most would say innovative, way. For those of you who aren’t familiar with NFC, it stands for Near Field Communication, and it’s basically a system that allows you to tap on an object that has an NFC tag embedded inside and then said tag transmits a small amount of data which your mobile phone can then parse. It’s bleeding edge stuff, and it’s definitely not a gimmick since it’s going to be the basis of the mobile payment revolution due to take place over the next few years, but at this moment in time the market is extremely limited and NFC is seen as a luxury technology. Just look at some of the prices in the NFC Hub: posters will cost you up to $40, business cards run $18 a pop, and NFC tags cost as much as $5. Now we know typing in contact details from the pile of business cards you collected during a conference is a pain, but we doubt companies are going to start printing $18 business cards for their employees just to save them 60 seconds.

All this being said, prices will inevitably come down, and we actually think Nokia is wise to enter the wider NFC ecosystem by selling things other than mobile phones. It’s kind of like rapper Dr. Dre, who is a musician, but also sells a range of equipment (speakers, headphones) to listen to music. That complete approach isn’t going to get him a monopoly, but it promotes his brand in more ways than one. We see Nokia’s NFC Hub as striving to accomplish a similar goal.

[Via: All About Symbian]

About The Author

Stefan Constantinescu

Stefan Constantinescu (@WhatTheBit on Twitter) has loved technology since as far back as he can remember. It started with computers, but in the past few years his passion has turned to mobile devices. As a mobile phone enthusiast who lives and breathes devices that connect to the internet, he knows he is not alone with this radical fascination of all things wireless. He is strongly opinionated and enjoys a good debate so leave comments in his posts and he’ll get back to you! Stefan began blogging as a hobby in the fall of 2006 and joined IntoMobile in the summer of 2007. Later he got a job at Nokia in March 2008, but as of June 2009 he has rejoined the IntoMobile team. He is currently based out of Helsinki, Finland.

  • http://twitter.com/csjaunja Christer Sjaunja

    Its not like you need more than one business card, you dont give them away! The purpose is to have one so people with NFC can tap on them.

  • Anonymous

    great story

  • Rupert Englander (Nokia)

    Hi. We reviewed our prices on the business cards following feedback. We had built in the cost of delivery, defaulting to Special Delivery which was a mistake.

    We appreciate that the post office can do a perfectly decent job using first class recorded delivery which means the retail price for an NFC-enabled business card to the UK delivered has now come down to £7 which we hope is more palatable. As another respondent has noted, we anticipate that you really only need 1 business card going forward when the technology penetration is ubiquitous in phones and people simply tap to get your details.

    I should also point out that the prices on the website are for one-off or very small scale orders (i.e. a handful. Once you get into higher volumes (and the volume break is not high), the prices come down considerably. Finally, all prices on the website include delivery,

    Thanks for the write up.
    Rupert

  • http://www.dealsbell.com/store/vistaprint/ vistaprint coupon code

    This is really cool technology but currently NFC is new into the market so it is very expensive to use. I think it will take at least 3 to 5 year to become more user friendly like wifi which you can found in every smartphone.