STMicroelectronics Simplifies Design-in of Secure Mobile-Transaction Capability for Wearables

Wearables like smart watches could challenge smartphones as the main hub for digital lifestyles now that a new product-development ecosystem from STMicroelectronics simplifies adding stronger security for mobile transactions.
 
More than half a billion wearable devices will be connected to the Internet by 2019: a potentially huge user base that could enjoy making convenient mobile payments with a secure device that is more natural to use than a card or smartphone.
 
ST’s new development ecosystem helps product designers integrate support for payment, ticketing, digital access and loyalty-card applications within wearable form factors, using the device’s main microcontroller with a hardware secure element providing strong protection against malicious attacks.
 
The ecosystem provides everything developers need to start building their applications on a host such as an STM32 microcontroller, choosing from proven secure-element devices in ST’s portfolio, and adding optional NFC (Near-Field Communication) antenna-booster technology by ams, a leading provider of high-performance analog ICs and sensors. The ams technology allows the use of ultra-small NFC antennas, which are ideal for wearables, and has already been used successfully in the mobile-payment reference design co-developed and announced by ST and ams in early 2015.
 
“Hardware-secured payments can make wearables even more attractive to a broader range of end users, helping both the wearables and the mobile-payments markets grow quickly to their full potential,” said Laurent Degauque, Secure Microcontroller Division marketing director, STMicroelectronics.