East Japan Railway Co. unveiled Friday a new commuter pass with a built-in integrated circuit chip that remotely signals the wicket system to allow a passenger to pass.
A JR East employee uses a new commuter pass that wirelessly communicates with the wicket machine.A commuter passing through a gate does not have to insert the card into the wicket but instead simply holds it above a specific area, although JR East will ask passengers to lightly touch the wicket with the card.
The IC-card, expected to eventually be used by millions of commuters, will even work when it is inside a pass holder.
JR East plans to introduce the new IC-card pass by the end of the year at 350 stations in the Kanto region.
The firm hopes the card's format will be a strong candidate for mainstream use in electronic money cards.
The new pass, nicknamed Suica, also features a rechargeable prepaid card function for fares that are not covered by the commuter pass route.
Passengers will be able to buy ticket credits worth up to 20,000 yen from terminals at railway stations.
The IC developed for the card is so small that it can be built into a variety of devices such as cellular phones and watches, said Takeshi Inoue, executive director at JR East.
Inoue said the company has already begun talks with three cellular phone operators, adding that in the future, users may be able to recharge e-money cards by using cellular phones containing the chip.
JR East plans to monitor use of the card by 10,000 commuters between the Yamanote Line's Ebisu Station, in Tokyo's Shibuya Ward, and Kawagoe Station on the Saikyo Line, Saitama Prefecture. The test will be conducted between April 8 and July 8.