Three Questions With Juergen Boehler, NFC Forum Technical Committee Chair about the ISO/IEC 14443 Analog Parameter Comparison and Alignment white paper

1. What is the NFC Forum – ISO/IEC 14443 Analog Parameter Comparison and Alignment white paper all about?

The NFC Forum – ISO/IEC 14443 Analog Parameter Comparison and Alignment white paper is a significant achievement. It is the result of a collaborative industry effort to lay some of the technical groundwork paving the way for public transport interoperability using NFC. Along with the NFC Forum, the European Committee for Standardization TC278 WG3 and GSMA were involved in its creation. The 143-page white paper defines a generic methodology to compare analog parameter limit values defined by the NFC Forum and ISO/IEC 14443. It documents the methodology, procedures and results developed to ensure that NFC Forum-conformant mobile devices interoperate with ISO/IEC 14443- and ISO/IEC 18092-conformant public transport readers and objects, clearing a path to ensure reliable public transportation fare payment, ticketing and access control using NFC-enabled devices, such as smartphones.

Download the NFC Forum – ISO/IEC 14443 Analog Parameter Comparison and Alignment white paper

2. Why did these industry leaders take on this technical challenge and what will it do for public transportation?

The catalyst for this collaborative industry effort was customer demand. Customers — end-users — want better mobility; they want a better user experience and they want these improvements within connected environments.  NFC is uniquely positioned to provide all three of these customer demands. NFC is a standard feature on most smartphones and enables communication between a reader and a card up to 10cm in proximity making it ideal for public transportation and payment applications. Eventual widespread adoption of NFC Forum standards in the public transportation industry will help create a more efficient and faster gate access and payment for customers using public transportation. This effort was another step forward in the ongoing efforts to harmonize various contactless interfaces to reduce interoperability issues and provide Public Transport Operators, Mobile Network Operators, and handset manufacturers with a roadmap for accelerating the implementation of NFC-enabled mobile ticketing.

3. Tell us about the latest book you read and what you liked about it.

I like historical novels or novels from other cultures as they allow me to see different viewpoints.

I recently read the historic novel Pope Joan by Donna Woolfolk Cross about the story of a female Catholic Pope in the early Middle Age. For me, it was personally interesting because this story brought me to my place of birth in Fulda where Joan studied physics and was ordained as a priest. So this book gave me an impression about how my ancestors lived more than 1000 years ago.

Download the NFC Forum – ISO/IEC 14443 Analog Parameter Comparison and Alignment white paper