Thyngs and Cellotape Smart Products form strategic alliance to power NFC-enabled marketing
Thyngs, a mobile proximity platform, and Cellotape Smart Products, a Resource Label Group company and provider of near field communication (NFC) and radio frequency ID (RFID) enabled products and labels, have announced a strategic alliance that will make it easier for organisations to deliver NFC-based proximity marketing campaigns at scale.
As part of the relationship, customers of both companies will be able to commission custom-designed NFC-enabled products and labels manufactured by Cellotape, pre-configured for the Thyngs proximity platform, which offers flexible management and reporting tools as well as QR code and Bluetooth beacon support. The announcement comes just a few weeks after Apple revealed its support for NFC tag reading on iPhone 7 and newer phones running the next release of its mobile operating system, iOS 11.
The alliance extends the commercial relationship between the two companies which saw them jointly power what is believed to be the biggest ever global NFC wearables marketing campaign for a blockbuster movie launch. As part of the campaign, fans and movie-goers across the world were given ‘smart’ temporary tattoos which could be tapped with an Android smartphone to access exclusive content and digital experiences.
Each of the 250,000 tattoos contained NFC chips, configured, managed and tracked via the Thyngs platform, providing real time location, usage, and interaction data. The Thyngs creative services team also designed the custom NFC products, with Cellotape providing manufacturing and global distribution, creating an end-to-end mobile engagement solution.
Neil Garner, Thyngs CEO, said: “This announcement cements our relationship with Cellotape Smart Products and builds on an innovative joint project that pioneered new forms of consumer interaction on a scale we have never seen before. It shows just how easily our platform can be used to deliver proximity-based campaigns and solutions at scale. Together with Cellotape we’ll be able to deliver even better experiences for our clients and their consumers.”
Nick Testanero, president of the NFC division at Cellotape Smart Products, said: “We are delighted to be forming this relationship with Thyngs which will further help our clients make anything possible using our smart NFC-enabled products and labels. Cellotape has a long history of innovation in this market, and is behind many iconic NFC marketing programs. Our recent collaboration with Thyngs is a testament to how we can deliver at unprecedented scales for large brands.”
