The market still lacks a clear understanding of what smart card technology is able to do in terms of security and processing. Hence, there is a need to crystallize the market's understanding of the differences between RFID and contactless smart cards so that better informed decisions can be made and suitable applications be employed for each technology. This will also help boost the growth of the two technologies.

"RFID as well as contactless smart cards are seeing healthy growth levels in the Asia Pacific region," notes Frost & Sullivan Industry Analyst Michelle Foong, "New applications continue to emerge and prices of devices such as cards, tags, and readers are falling as the market matures in some of the key applications."

Smart cards have become popular in a several key applications such as mass transit, government transactions, banking, and access control. RFID on the other hand is more popular for tracking items and goods, like supply chain and logistics management.

"Confusion between the two technologies could eventually impede the potential growth of the both the RFID and contactless smart cards markets," says Foong, "Hence, it is imperative that market participants work towards increasing market awareness of both their capabilities and features so that users are able to make better informed decisions when selecting the type of technology to be used for specific applications."