EMV Migration Driving Demand for INSIDE’s MicroPass Contactless Payment Platform

AIX-EN-PROVENCE, France, May 21, 2008–In a move to meet the growing demand for smart cards in Canada, INSIDE Contactless, the world leader in advanced contactless microprocessor platforms, today strengthened its position in the market and announced that it has joined Advanced Card Technologies (ACT) Canada. Having already delivered more than five million of its intelligent MicroPass® contactless payment chips for MasterCard® PayPass™ deployments in just the past six months, INSIDE Contactless has quickly established itself as the leading provider of contactless payment technology to the Canadian market, and is now poised to deliver technology to aid in the convergence with EMV and other non-contactless applications.

“When Canada’s largest quick service restaurant chain, Tim Hortons, began supporting contactless payments in its 2200-plus locations last year, the stage was set for a surge in demand for this technology, and we are committed to delivering cost-effective, high-performance solutions for this emerging market,” said Charles Walton, executive vice president of payments at INSIDE Contactless. “Canada is also in the midst of a major EMV migration, creating what we believe will be a substantial market opportunity for dual-interface cards later this year, and we are preparing to support this market as well.”

According to ACT Canada, chip and pin payment cards will be deployed in significant numbers over the next five years as credit and debit cards are converted to EMV standards, creating opportunities in a variety of markets, including transit, retail, and access.

“INSIDE Contactless has been a valued partner as a supplier of chips used in MasterCard PayPass deployments, and they continue to play an important role in helping our issuers to get to market with their PayPass programs,” said Cathleen Conforti, senior vice president, Global PayPass, MasterCard Worldwide. “The new MicroPass 4003 has been granted type approval and CAST approval and is ready for deployment in MasterCard PayPass products.”

“MasterCard PayPass is delivering a new level of convenience and security to Canadian consumers while creating a compelling value for issuers, and we expect it will gain wide acceptance in the Canadian marketplace in the year ahead,” said Kevin Stanton, president, MasterCard Canada. “We welcome INSIDE Contactless to the Canadian market, and appreciate their commitment and support of our efforts to deliver a simpler way to pay.”

“We welcome INSIDE Contactless to ACT Canada and look forward to their contributions to the rapidly emerging Canadian smart card market,” said Catherine Johnston, president and CEO of ACT Canada. “Advanced card technologies like those offered by INSIDE Contactless strengthen the Canadian smart card market by providing security, convenience and ease of use for Canadians. As infrastructure is deployed for EMV we expect Canadians will want a broad range of smart card applications.”

MicroPass is already the platform of choice for card manufacturers and issuers in the U.S. market, where more than 50 million MicroPass-powered bank cards have been deployed. With very low power requirements, MicroPass also remains the most suitable core platform for key fob and alternative form factor deployments.

The MicroPass family of intelligent payment products is designed to power open standard contactless and dual interface bank card payments in all global regions. Based upon a RISC architecture and optimized to the demanding requirements of contactless transactions, each of the MicroPass family of products feature low power consumption, fast transaction processing, and overall performance meeting the demands of issuer organizations in the bank card payments, transit, and access control markets.

About INSIDE Contactless

INSIDE’s innovative, contactless and NFC semiconductor solutions are transforming how the world conducts transactions and information exchange. The company is the world leader in advanced contactless microprocessor platforms with 55 patents and more than 100 million products delivered worldwide. INSIDE enables bank card issuers, retailers, device manufacturers, service providers, and card brand organizations to deliver innovative consumer products and services with a high “cool factor” and outstanding user experience. INSIDE is headquartered in Aix-en-Provence, France, with offices in Shanghai, Singapore, Warsaw, Seoul, San Francisco, and Boston. For more information, please visit http://www.insidecontactless.com.

Contacts

Elise Koenig
AxiCom
+33 1 41 06 18 07
elise@axicom-france.com

Jean-Marie Amoros
AxiCom
+33 1 41 06 18 05
jeanmarie@axicom-france.com