High-tech Vending Machines

Former Gartner analyst Vinnie Mirchandani usualy posts on his deal architect blog from an enterprise software, business process and outsourcing/offshoring perspective.

However, his latest post on high-tech vending machines also has mobile connotations. As Mirchandani notes, today's vending machines are quite sophisticated (if you watch the Food Network's "Unwrapped" program you would know this already). He writes that the "Finns who love their cell phones (and the local success Nokia) figured out a way to use those phones to pay for vending machines - 8 years ago!"

He also cites an article in Hospitality Net that describes, "a whole bunch of wireless, GPS, PDA, electronic payment, data exchange and other technologies are making the vending machine smarter each day - and enabling "V-Commerce"."

So my question is, if the vending machine industry has been able to figure this out then how come mobile commerce is still in its infancy (except for Japan of course)? Enquiring minds want to know...