Square COO Says NFC Has No Value

Keith Rabois, COO of mobile payment firm Square was on hand at the GigaOM mobilize conference and made a statement that NFC has no value. He went so far as to say that he has never met a retailer that said they wanted NFC tech in their store. Like many things tech, HFC needs a certain critical mass before it is appealing to the consumer. All retailers are really only interested in what the consumer wants, this is how they choose what products to stock.

Once NFC reaches the point where consumers are interested and it's readily available in smartphones and other products, retailers will start to become interested in NFC. Google is rolling out its NFC Google wallet system and will eventually offer NFC stickers that allow consumers that have smartphones and their devices that lack internal NFC to make payments. The ecosystem is growing with a big name behind it.

Rabois thinks that despite the growing ecosystem, most consumers are still not interested in NFC tech. I think that before many people are interested in NFC tech we need to see the retailer side use of NFC grow. If I could walk up to the cashier at Walmart and the cashier knew what was in my basket thanks to NFC tags on the stuff I am buying and could have the total when I walk up leaving only bagging it would be great. When I can tap my phone on the reader, pay, and be ready to go faster than I can today I am all for NFC tech. Make me wait less in that long line and I am all for NFC. What do you think, is NFC tech going to take off and does it offer value to you?

[via Gigaom]