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Executive Director’s Letter
Dear members and friends of the Alliance,
The competing strategies for the power position in the world of NFC and the determined efforts to achieve an early advantage in the lucrative mobile payments market have started to come into focus. Last month’s flashy New York announcement by Google about the Google Wallet pilot planned for the fall in New York and San Francisco included a “dream team” of notable NFC ecosystem partners along with more than a dozen notable retailers including Macy’s, Bloomingdales, American Eagle Outfitters, Subway, Foot Locker, and Walgreens.
What makes Google’s announcement a very bold statement for the rest of the industry is that they have managed to align under one marketing banner–Google Wallet–a payment brand (MasterCard), a bank (Citi), and a [trust] broker (First Data), plus the lone mobile operator (Sprint) not currently in the other competing mobile operator-led joint venture, Isis. Previously, Google’s reach into the still-evolving NFC ecosystem had been more closely associated with mobile device hardware and software as the provider of the Android operating system which runs on a large variety of mobile devices. Android OS devices support NFC through the embedded secure element built into the handset. Adding Google’s dominant merchant- and consumer-facing Internet services business can now enable advertising and retail promotions. Google’s relationship with major retailers will leverage the NFC features on Android-powered phones and enable contactless payments-enabled retailers to drive traffic for mobile promotions. Combining this with mobile payments create an exciting new experience for technology-savvy consumers. The Google-powered hardware connection to the Google Wallet creates a barrier for users of iPhones and Blackberry mobile devices, and possibly future Microsoft-powered Nokia devices, unless Google opens up its architecture to non-Android phones in the future.
SCALA Associate Director’s Letter
Dear SCALA–Smart Card Alliance Latin America Member and Friends,
I hope all of you have had a wonderful month since our last newsletter. During this time, SCALA has been present in several industry events that have shown how smart card technology has gathered strength in the different vertical markets. Smart cards have taken the center stage in payments, identity, transportation, and mobile markets and have started to gain some traction in healthcare. This has caused me to reflect upon our messaging since the current market position shows a great deal of buy-in from the leadership of each vertical market that is influenced by the technology. So I ask, what should be the central industry message that we deliver as a united voice represented by SCALA?
Well, the fact is that we are now in the most important evolutionary stage of SCALA’s existence. We have industries adopting our technology to help solve real and significant problems, and they are using the SCALA knowledge base, information and training to help guide their processes and ensure success in their objectives. As an industry, we now need to communicate that the implementation of smart card technology provides an opportunity to use the embedded chip to introduce value-added services, applications, and other technologies associated with smart cards such as PKI and biometrics. The prospect of being able to deliver services and applications securely in a single card is finally a reality and we need to organize our members and related industries to communicate how we can address the challenges ahead.
Member Profile
This month Smart Card Talk spoke with Ah-Young Kim, from the Overseas Business Division of KEBTechnology, the leading smart card platform solution provider in Korea.
1. What are KEBTechnology’s main business profile and offerings?
KEBTechnology has devoted all of its efforts to building the infrastructure on which smart cards can be utilized. Together with this, we have developed products for every field in which smart cards can be used, including financial, telecommunications and public fields, obtaining domestic and overseas certifications and building the industrial foundation that can lead the market. KEBTechnology’s technological expertise in the public sector was first recognized overseas when we received the order for Thailand’s National ID card business in 2007, in total amount of 26 million cards.
Feature of the Month
NFC: Facts at Glance
If you follow the payments industry, you see multiple news stories daily talking about Near Field Communication (NFC)–covering which handsets support NFC, what new applications are being NFC-enabled, what partnerships are being formed to launch the technology, and what rumors are making the rounds about key market players’ plans for NFC. With all of the market anticipation for NFC and other mobile applications, this month’s Smart Card Talk article focuses on answering a few fundamental questions about NFC.
Upcoming CSCIP Training and Exam Dates
Visit /activities-leap for registration information.
| CSCIP Training & Exam Prep Course¹ |
CSCIP Exam | City, State, Country |
| November 1, 2011 (CSCIP & CSCIP/G) |
November 4, 2011 | Washington, DC (Smart Cards in Government Conf) |
| November 14, 2011 (CSCIP only) |
November 16 or 17 | Paris, FRANCE² (Cartes & Identification 2011) |
| ¹ This full day course is held from 9:00am–4:30pm at a location to be named in the city, state listed above. The cost for attending this course is $475 ($380 for members). ² International CSCIP training and exam pricing varies from standard pricing. Please contact [email protected] for further details. |
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New CSCIP Accreditations
Congratulations to the LEAP members who have successfully completed the requirements for professional accreditation as Certified Smart Card Industry Professionals.
View the entire list of Certified Smart Card Industry Professionals.
| Name | Company | Certified Since |
| Michael Chiviendaez | Entrust | May 2011 |
| Mike Neumann | Gemalto | May 2011 |
New CSCIP/G Accreditations
Congratulations to the LEAP members who have successfully completed the requirements for professional accreditation as Certified Smart Card Industry Professionals / Government.
View the entire list of Certified Smart Card Industry Professionals / Government.
| Name | Company | Certified Since |
| Jeffrey Barry | CertiPath LLC | May 2011 |
| Neil Bolin | CertiPath LLC | May 2011 |
| Martin Bouchard | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Tim Bramble | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Gary Brown | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Angelo Buscemi | May 2011 | |
| Muhammad Umar Saleem Butt | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Philippe Cote | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Gordon Coulson | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Debs Debs-Faouzi | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Paul H Evans | Paul Evans & Associates | May 2011 |
| Jim Freeley | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Chris Ghantous | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Walid Saab | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |
| Christopher Wood | Entrust Technologies | June 2011 |