NFC, as it was originally envisioned, was supposed to allow for use even when the phone was without power just as the cards today are without power. In traditio

NFC, as it was originally envisioned, was supposed to allow for use even when the phone was without power just as the cards today are without power. In traditional RFID technology, from which NFC was derived, there was a powered transceiver (aka reader) and non-powered transponder (aka card). The promise of NFC was to be able to have a transceiver and transponder in one, where the power is derived from the inductive coupling of the antennae. You can see this by reviewing the ISO documents for ISO 14443 (RFID) and ISO 18092/ 21481 (NFC).