Mobile Payments through Near Field

This thesis has been assigned by TeliaSonera to Stockholm School of Economics. The purpose of this research has been to give a second opinion regarding the possibilities of m-payments through NFC and the barriers to overcome to make this a reality. Today there is an enormous amount of research done on the technical solutions of NFC but almost none is done on business solutions and models for the various actors. Neither have the requirements and demands for the actors been indentified which is a critical factor for success. Therefore, the goal of this thesis is to investigate the current situation for all involved actors and to answer the question: Where should the actors go next in the future? Especially in the situation of mobile payments through NFC. In this work articles, white papers and trials have been investigated to shed light over how the progress are today. Further on in this research, an event dealing with the subject of NFC has been attended to be able to find cutting edge examples from the leading industries. In order to come to terms with what conditions and demands the different main actors have on their possible participation in the ecosystem, which is a key step for solving the issue of business models, a focus group was also arranged. To confirm and complement the emerged data one-on-one interviews were held with various main actors. This research has showed that the different actors in the value constellation have various conditions and demands. Depending on how well the actors in the ecosystem deals with these issues will determine how successful m-payments through NFC can become. One forgotten actor in many researches is the end-users, this actor proved to be a critical factor of success. The results showed that without them, m-payments through NFC never can become a success and that their voice regarding their demands and requirements are most important to meet. Another common thread among the main business actors was that transaction costs raise a concern pertaining to how effective NFC m-payments would be to replace cash. As to the roles of the various actors the results showed that the actors building this ecosystem should focus on their core businesses and competences. Doing so will help this process to become more effective and simpler to run. The only exception to this is the mobile network operators who could expand their business area and take on the role as a virtual account holder in the assistance of reducing transactions costs in low value transactions. In the discussion of which secure element that should be used the SIM Card alternative was the only plausible solution by the participating actors in this research. It was for example the only one that could fulfill all the requirements needed for a quick launch to be possible in the nearby future. As to the structure and organization of the TSM the research found that the operator centric, the fullyor the partly independent models were the ones to use. Which ones to use depends on the context but the partly-independent model would be the one to prefer especially in a startup phase. As to the TSM ́s role towards the end-user this research showed that there were differences in opinions regarding whether they should have this connection or not. An explanation to this could be that many actors do not want to jeopardize or deteriorate their current hold of the end-users. Mobilbetalningar genom Närfältskommunikation En teknisk och ekonomisk analys av potentiella affärsmodeller