Opening Remarks by Mr. Alfred Ng, Assistant Government Chief Information Officer, at the NFC Conference 2007 of the ICT Expo
17 - 04 - 2007

John, Nelson, Distinguished Guests, Ladies and Gentlemen,

Good morning! It is my great pleasure today to deliver the opening remarks for the "NFC Conference 2007". I understand that this is the first NFC Conference ever held in the ICT Expo, and I am really honored to be invited to speak at this event.

Introduction

Near Field Communications or in short, NFC, may be a terminology new to some of you. You may wonder what NFC is, and whether it is a brand new technology in the market. In fact, it is not. It is a technology that we have been using for years. You may not have noticed -- the Octopus Card that we are carrying day-to-day and using it daily for transportation, payment, access control and many other functions is actually using this NFC technology.

Tool and Media

NFC does not only exist in the form of Smart Card as in the case of Octopus. NFC chip can be embedded in other devices such as mobile phone, making it an NFC-enabled equipment.

As you may agree, mobile phone has become an essential accessory in our daily life. The mobile phone penetration rate in Hong Kong stands at over 135%, and nearly every adult citizens in Hong Kong would have a mobile phone. Given its high penetration, mobile phone would be, in addition to Octopus, yet another powerful and pervasive tool to help roll out NFC applications in the Hong Kong market.

Potential Applications

Applications using NFC technology are numerous, and they would be very innovative. With an NFC-enabled mobile phone, you can use it for secured payment over the counter or via the Internet, for withdrawing money from ATM machines, and even for credit payment as if you are using your credit card. Other than payment, NFC-enabled phones can also serve as a reader to obtain product information from Kiosks or posters, and even exchange data with others' handsets.

I have just named a few examples here to highlight the business potential of the NFC technology. I believe that other speakers and NFC experts in today's conference would provide you more insight and ideas on other potential NFC applications.

Trends and Forecast

NFC is under rapid development, and undoubtedly it will revolutionize our daily lives. With its ease-of-use features, NFC has been gaining wider acceptance and increasing popularity globally. According to the research figures produced by ABI , the number of NFC-enabled mobile phones will increase from 50 million in 2006 up to about 450 million by 2011, which represents about 50% of the total number of mobile phones shipped then. We can see that there would be a 9-fold increase in 5 years. This reflects a huge market potential of NFC that industry players may wish to explore and ride on.

Potentials in Hong Kong

In Hong Kong, 95% of the population possesses an Octopus card, while the mobile phone penetration rate is over 135%. Most of the Hong Kong citizens may either possess an Octopus card or a mobile phone, or both. As Octopus card and mobile phone are both good carriers of the NFC technology, they jointly create a very favorable environment for rolling out NFC applications in Hong Kong.

As you may know, the Retail sector is a key component of the economy of Hong Kong. It has a close affiliation with other industries in Hong Kong, e.g. Tourism. NFC technology, given its characteristics of prevalence, low cost and ease-of-use, lends itself a very desirable candidate for supporting Retail applications.

On one hand, NFC technology provides a good match for supporting the Retail businesses in Hong Kong. On the other hand, the Retail environment of Hong Kong offers a fertile ground for NFC to flourish here.

Synergy

NFC can, by itself, offer a lot of opportunities and possibilities. However, its full potential would only be unleashed if it can be adopted in conjunction with other suitable technologies.

As you may know, the Government is planning to launch a Programme to provide Wi-Fi facilities at Government premises. This will offer a timely opportunity for exploring the collaboration between NFC and Wi-Fi. While NFC can provide near field communication between mobile devices, Wi-Fi can provide longer distance communication and can enable connection to the Internet. In combination, they offer much synergy, and give rise to a lot of possibilities and innovative solutions that one can image.

In fact, we have seen practical implementation of collaboration of NFC and Wi-Fi in real life. A recent example is the Ubiquitous Technology Project in Ginza of Japan in which NFC, Wi-Fi and other wireless technologies have been deployed together to facilitate the provision of commodity information, route guidance, sales and promotion materials, etc. to citizens and tourists.

Conclusion

To conclude, NFC is a promising technology which has great potential to flourish in Hong Kong. It would bring benefits to enterprises and citizens from the consumers' perspective. It would offer business opportunities to ICT players from the suppliers' angle.

The prevalence of Octopus cards and mobile phones, the prosperous retail industry, and the Government Wi-Fi Programme are all favorable factors that are unique and conducive to the development of NFC applications in Hong Kong. I would like to appeal to our industry colleagues to leverage on this valuable opportunity and to join hand in fostering a better ICT industry and community of Hong Kong.

Finally, I would like to thank the WTIA and RTIA for organizing this meaningful event. I wish you all a fruitful and enjoyable conference.

Thank you.

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