Mx. Vernier, who uses gender-neutral pronouns, described often having to slightly move the ring around in search of the “sweet spot” of a phone’s NFC reader. “That’s the way technology works — it always works until someone’s looking.” When an attendee at a recent racial-equity conference asked Robert F. Smith for his contact information, the private-equity billionaire furnished a white plastic card with a gold QR code printed on it. The guest held her phone above the card to scan it. Nothing happened. For the next minute or so, she positioned her phone at various distances from the card while Mr. Smith, the chief executive of Vista Equity Partners, tried different grips and angles. When that didn’t work, Mr. Smith pulled out a different card with a black QR code. Success. Mr. Smith was unbowed. “I appreciate good sense tech solutions,” he said in a written statement later. “I don’t miss paper cards at all.”
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