The electrowallet cometh

Dainippon Printing has developed an e-money/e-ticket terminal, the Ubiquitous Network Passport Advanced-Light (Ubinet Pass AD-L), that should be starting mass production in May. Slip in a GSM/3GPP-compliant SIM card with your e-money stored on it, and you have an e-wallet from which you can spend by swiping it over the necessary reader. Recharging is done via a PC using the USB connection. An LED screen allows you to check your remaining balance, and the device will also read RFID tags to display information about products, for example. Runs on the T-Engine Forum's T-Kernel realtime OS, based on the TRON OS widely used in Japanese cellphones. There are also plans to include Bluetooth and a fingerprint sensor in future versions.

At 62 x 32 x 17 mm and 20g in weight, this sounds like a convenient option for people who don't want their wallet and cellphone integrated (though we guess people will become much more careful about forgetting or losing their cellphones once they have money/train passes in them).

[Via K-Tai Watch (Japanese)]