NFC Wallet overview

NFC Wallet is Thales’ cloud-based solution for EMV payment Tokenization.

With NFC Wallet, issuers and wallet providers can digitize payment cards from any supported payment network to a digital wallet application running on the end user’s mobile device. These digitized cards can then be used on that mobile device for EMV contactless transactions.

According to the EMV payment Tokenization framework, NFC Wallet acts as a Token requestor platform in the payment ecosystem. It is mainly composed of:

• NFC Wallet backend – A cloud-hosted business application connected to multiple Token Service Providers (TSPs).

• NFC Wallet SDK – A client SDK integrated into the digital wallet application running on the end user’s mobile device.

The figure below illustrates the NFC Wallet solution.

High-level NFC Wallet architecture and main components

NFC Wallet provides a single integration point for wallet providers to interact with multiple Token Service Providers (TSPs).

NFC Wallet is connected with Mastercard and Visa services, and it allows extension to other payment networks and domestic schemes.

NFC Wallet also supports its own TSP for the Thales white-label payment scheme framework called PURE, which can be used in domestic networks or in closed-loop scenarios.

Token requestor

The Token requestor is the provider of the digital wallet application (wallet provider).

Each Token requestor must be registered and uniquely identified by each token program that the customer wants to join.

Once registered in a token program, NFC Wallet can enable connectivity with the appropriate TSPs on behalf of the Token requestor (that is, customer onboarding).

NFC Wallet SDK

The NFC Wallet SDK is the main entry point of the solution in your digital wallet application installed on the end user’s mobile device. It is securely connected to the NFC Wallet backend.

The NFC Wallet SDK is a development kit that exposes a unified set of APIs to support different payment networks.

Using the SDK, you retain full control over the in-app user experience and screen flows in your digital wallet application, while the NFC Wallet product handles the payment network–specific business logic.

The NFC Wallet SDK is available for Android and iOS.

In many cases, your NFC Wallet integration effort on your own infrastructure can be limited to integrating the NFC Wallet SDK into your digital wallet application.

NFC Wallet backend

The NFC Wallet backend is deployed in the cloud with high availability.

It provides connectivity to different TSPs and implements the required business flows according to each payment network’s specifications.