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Aconite collaborates with Ecebs to deliver multi-function transit and payments smart cards
London, 12th November 2009
Combination of complementary technologies creates unique smart card solution
London, 12th November 2009. Aconite, a leading provider of software and consulting services for managing business applications on chips in smart cards, tokens or mobiles, today announced that it will collaborate with Ecebs Limited, which provides complementary ground-breaking smart card technology, to develop and deliver a smart card that combines transport ticketing and payment capabilities with other services. The combination of Aconite’s back-office smart card administration and transaction processing software with Ecebs’ software for developing on-card applications will provide a unique end-to-end solution for managing smart card products, individual smart cards and their applications.
Both companies have substantial experience with multi-function, EMV (chip and pin), transit and other types of smart card projects and are leaders in their fields. The transit functions will be based on the ITSO specification issued by ITSO Limited (formerly the Integrated Transport Smartcard Organisation), which is being widely adopted in the UK and internationally for transit related smart card projects. Smart card products developed and managed by the new combined solution could, therefore, be processed by any terminal complying with the ITSO and/or EMV specifications. The possibilities are not limited to cards; other chip-enabled form factors (such as mobile phones and smart tokens like key fobs) can also be handled.
“There are considerable advantages to transit operators in adopting solutions based on global standards”, commented Patrick Regester, Aconite’s SVP of Sales and Marketing, “Equipment manufactured to such standards benefits from global economies of scale and, consequently, is cheaper than kit based on purely regional or local requirements. Further, there are greater opportunities to forge partnerships with complementary firms to broaden the acceptance and utility of the smart cards issued. There is an established trend towards issuing combined transit/payment smart cards. We believe that the end-to-end development and processing capability, from smart product conception to live processing, provided by the new Aconite/Ecebs solution will give transit operators and banks the powerful tool they need to create and manage innovative, multi-function smart card products”.
Alan Moody, Managing Director of Ecebs commented: “There is obvious synergy in the combination of Ecebs and Aconite’s existing smart card solutions. As a combined solution, issuers developing and processing their smart cards on this technology will have all the facilities they need for successful delivery in a highly secure environment. Ecebs smartcard experience enabled us to play a key role in the ITSO environment from its very beginning. Ecebs designed the ITSO Secure Application Module (ISAM). We also developed and continue to support the ITSO Security Management System (ISMS) which sits at the top of the pyramid of trust in the ITSO hierarchy Ecebs HOPS software is currently running in Transport Scotland and processing in excess of 200,000 transactions per day. This amounts to approximately 80% of all live ITSO transactions in the UK.”
About Ecebs
Ecebs is a smart card software development company and is a subsidiary company of Trainline Investments Holdings Limited. Ecebs technology can be found in everyday Smartcard uses such as 'Chip and Pin' payment cards ( EMV), Identity, Healthcare and Smartcard Transport ticketing solutions such as ITSO . In addition to providing software applications that reside on the card, we also provide back office software solutions for smart card schemes themselves. Our focus has been on the use of multiple applications on one card rather than many cards for different purposes. We developed a patented technology called Multefile ™, which securely deploys multi applications on a smartcard which can be updated or changed post issuance. For example this might be a smart card which provides multimodal transport entitlements with a pre paid application and the capability to integrate with existing legacy systems.
For more information see: www.ecebs.com
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