Swatch have just announced the new Swatch Bellamy, an NFC equipped wrist watch that you can use to pay for goods in high street shops.
The Bellamy was announced at the landmark Swatch Art Peace Hotel in Shanghai.
The Swiss watch maker have teamed up with China UnionPay and Bank Of Communication to introduce a new pay-by-the-wrist contactless payment system. The technology will initially be used in China with no release dates for any other part of the world so far, but we will let you know if we hear anything different in the future.
The first four models will feature different coloured designs keeping them in line with the Swiss Swatch fashion. The technology inside will be NFC, meaning Near Field Communication which can be found in our contactless bank cards today.
The inspiration for these watches came from American author Edward Bellamy who first wrote about contactless payments, and a world without cash in his 1888 novel, “Looking Backward 2000-1887.” Bellamy was the first to write about this kind of utopian world with cash being replaced by debit/credit cards and he definitely wasn’t wrong.
In today’s world, contactless payment can be found in nearly all major shops with a transaction value cap at around £20.00.
We have been told that Swatch Bellamy will soon be launched in Switzerland with a Swiss bank and secure transaction partner, as well as in the USA.
