Update 9/20 22:00: The TS Cubic press release has been removed from their web site.
Update 9/22: The official announcement was made today see the updated post.
Along with the release of iOS 11, Apple Pay added support for two more Japanese credit cards: JCB J/Speedy and Mastercard Contactless. Both are issued under Toyota Finance Corporation’s TS CUBIC Card brand. J/Speedy and Mastercard Contactless are marketed as credit card brands specifically tailored for NFC and contactless payments.
The TS CUBIC press statement [now deleted] says the cards use the QUICPay payment system with Apple Pay and require iOS 11. Japanese IT journalist Junya Suzuki reports via Twitter that J/Speedy and MasterCard Contactless both use NFC A-B not FeliCa. This appears to be a iOS 11 Apple Pay feature that enables smart NFC A-B-F on the fly switching, an improvement over iOS 10 and a step towards contactless payments that ‘just work’ everywhere.
The new NFC Pay (Contactless EMV) logo is on the far leftiOS 11 and Seamless NFC
This finally solves the mystery of the new Apple Pay Japan page NFC Pay (EMV contactless) payment system logo that appeared after the iPhone keynote. With iOS 11 Apple Pay improvements and NFC Pay/EMV contactless support maybe VISA will finally throw in the towel and officially join the Apple Pay Japan parade. Next up VISA payWave aka Visa Contactless?
Using Apple Pay in Japan requires FeliCa (NFC-F) which is fully supported globally in iPhone 8, iPhone X and Apple Watch Series 3.