Europeans Develop Versatile Smart Cards

Staff -- Semiconductor International, 4/1/1998

The Smart Card '98 meeting held Feb. 17-19 in London emphasized the trend toward versatile smart cards that can be used in a wide variety of applications. They include not only contactless cards, but also dual-interface combined contact/contactless cards. Cards with contacts for insertion into a reader tend to  be preferred as very secure bank and credit cards, but contactless cards are advantageous where it is important to minimize transaction time, such as in automatic fare collection and access control systems in public transport vehicles at busy times. Such a card need only be passed within some 50 to 100 mm of the card reader, but problems can occur if a number of cards are simultaneously passed near the reader. Dual-interface cards serve as both contact and contactless cards and reduce the number of cards a person needs to carry.

Ian Duthie, world marketing manager of the Smart Information Transfer Division at Motorola, told conference delegates of the extra complexities of contactless cards. Each contains an antenna that must receive RF power from a card reader. This RF signal is modulated to send data to the card, which must also be able to return data to the reader. He stressed the need for a defined industry standard to allow cards and readers from various manufacturers to work together. Motorola, SGS-Thomson and NEC have agreed to cooperate to achieve such a standard. Duthie said contactless technology has evolved from the use of a separate memory chip for contact operation to the use of a single hybrid chip that performs both functions. However, the level of security in the low-power contactless mode of operation is lower. He added that it is extremely difficulty with today's technology to provide enough power to a contactless card to operate a crypto-processor, but the next generation of cards will see the introduction of a dual-interface chip incorporating a crypto-processor that is used in the contact mode only.

Europe is the most active region in the world for smart card chip production, with its three major indigenous chip producers - SGS-Thomson (Italy and France), Philips (the Netherlands) and Siemens (Germany) - all heavily involved in the field, while Motorola has set up its world smart card center in Scotland. SGS-Thomson is involved in a Microelectronics Development for Electronic Applications (MEDEA) collaborative program known as "Multi-Application Secure Smart Card" (MASSC). This aims to develop the VLSI submicron microelectronic components required for a new generation of high-security 32 bit smart cards for high-value transactions. It will include a fast, easily programmable smart card platform especially for Java, etc. The company is also independently developing contactless smart cards.

At a joint press conference, Philips Semiconductors and Hitachi announced their agreement to develop contactless smart cards using the Philips Semiconductors "MIFARE" technology, for which some 30 million cards are in use, with more than 1 billion transactions already processed. It is claimed that this contactless card system covers about 90% of this fast-growing market. Apart from Philips Semiconductors and Hitachi, Siemens is also licensed to independently provide MIFARE chip card devices. Philips Semiconductors has made its MIFARE interface technology ISO/IEC 14443 Type A patent rights available to any company.

Bernt Karlsson, managing director at Metget AB (Ronneby, Sweden), commented, "Europe is well ahead of the United States in the adoption of contactless smart cards, but even in Europe the volume explosion is yet to come. The European market will be focused on ISO standard contactless cards. I also believe the United States will adopt cards to this thinner standard. It is important that contactless cards with their embedded antenna and chip are easily printable."

Daniel Burns, general manager of Schlumberger Cards (Felixstowe, England), added, "There are already about two smart cards per adult in the UK. This has barely scratched the surface for a mass of different applications and enhanced technology, such as combined contact/contactless cards to open new markets, including access control and transport. The race is now on in the UK to develop cards that combine flexible payment functionality with additional applications, such as loyalty, in preparation for a national roll-out of bank smart cards." Schlumberger said the UK has become the most influential smart card market in the world.