RIM's UK chief talks up NFC for BlackBerrys

One of the tech buzz words of 2011 already looks set to be Near-Field Communications (NFC), with major smartphone manufacturers, banks and mobile operators all announcing their intention to use the technology.

One company jumping on this bandwagon is smartphone giant RIM, whose chief executive, Jim Balsillie, bragged at Mobile World Congress that "virtually all" of its new devices in 2011 will feature the technology.

V3.co.uk spoke to RIM's UK managing director, Stephen Bates, at a Westminster Forum event in London recently, and asked him why the company is making such a big play around NFC.

"We think NFC is going to be really big and, with the security heritage we can bring to this space, we think BlackBerry devices will be the safest place to carry out secure mobile payments," he said.

However, when pressed for details on what the devices would be, including whether this meant an NFC-enabled PlayBook, or simply when they would hit the market, Bates said only that they would be out "later this year".

Clearly, RIM thinks it's vital to announce this intention to prove it is keeping pace with key innovations in the smartphone market as it becomes ever more competitive.

The Microsoft-Nokia snub
When Microsoft and Nokia announced their strategic smartphone partnership at the start of February, Microsoft chief executive Steve Ballmer and Nokia Chief executive Stephen Elop repeated many times that they wanted to become "the third player in the smartphone market".

They meant against the behemoths that are Apple with its iPhone and iPad empire, and Android, which is now the world's largest smartphone platform.

For many, what was interesting was the way both chief executives seemed to be purposefully overlooking RIM.