Japan’s largest mobile telco, NTT DoCoMo, plans to expand the market for its contactless wallet phones to Hong Kong, allowing subscribers there to tap their handsets to make purchases, spend tickets and use other services.

The contactless wallet will be built into at least some of DoCoMo’s i-mode, mobile Internet, phones that Hong Kong operator Hutchison Telecommunications plans to introduce in the Chinese districts of Hong Kong and Macau by the end of the year.

DoCoMo has introduced i-mode in 24 countries in Europe and elsewhere in partnership with 15 mobile operators, but Hong Kong and Macau would be the first foreign market to use the wallet phones. More than 10 million DoCoMo subscribers carry the phones, which the telco introduced in 2004; and DoCoMo has since launched its own credit card service subscribers can load onto the newer wallet handsets. ( CardTechnology )