Thales gains over 50% market penetration for smart card personalisation and preparation systems following deployment of P3™ at major Middle Eastern bank

 Thales today announced that one of the larger Middle Eastern banks has chosen its P3 technology for smart card preparation and personalisation. This win cements a great year for Thales in the Middle East where it has gained over 50% market penetration for smart card personalisation and preparation systems. This latest announcement further highlights the enormous return on investment (ROI) and business agility benefits of deploying the P3 system.

Thales’ P3 is the leading solution in the field of EMV smart card data preparation and personalisation and with half a dozen banks in the Middle East deploying the technology over the past year – this represents about half of the banks in the region that are known to have completed their EMV migration. With EMV migration set to soar over the next few months, Thales is anticipating significant take up of its P3 solution.

P3 was chosen so that the bank would not be reliant on a card bureau for the issuance of its smart cards. This means that the bank is now able to produce 1,000 cards per hour and meet its target of issuing 300,000 cards to its customers over the next three months.

The solution will be delivered following the integration of most of the available smart card embossers, the Thales P3 smart card preparation and personalisation process and Verisoft’s PowerEMV, a network oriented EMV platform smart card personalisation system. This integration will provide the bank with an off-the-shelf solution that is smart card platform independent.

Not only has the move to in-house card issuance allowed the bank to dramatically reduce the costs of smart card deployment, but it has also increased business agility. When using a card bureau, the bank typically had to plan its card deployment three months in advance and wait at least two weeks from the moment of order to the cards being delivered. In-house card issuance eradicates such delays and is flexible enough to accommodate any business requirements for the type of card deployed to be changed. There are now plans for the bank to introduce further applications onto its smart cards, such as loyalty schemes.

Thales’ P3 handles the Data Preparation and Key Management, which is required to write information to smart cards. It also supports the use of photos on the smart cards as well as the enablement of offline PIN use. This is a process where the authentication of the transaction needs only be referred to the bank every five or six transactions. For the remaining transactions, the chip itself provides the authentication with P3 preparing the required strong cryptography.

The P3 technology supports the MULTOS operating system (OS) selected by the bank. The MULTOS OS is the most secure multi-application smart card OS in the world, providing customers with high level security for their information and authorisation details stored on the smart card. The MULTOS platform also provides a mechanism for updating software on the credit card after it has been issued, which means a number of different applications can be held on a single smart card simultaneously, separately and securely.

The success of P3 in the Middle East builds upon Thales’ reputation as a trusted provider of secure banking technology. This includes the Thales HSM (Host Security Module), which is used by over 70% of Middle East banks to authenticate transactions. Thales is also working closely with other major banks in the Gulf, to supply technologies associated with secure authentication within their country Payment network.

Chris Woods, regional business manager of Thales’ e-Security business line said: “The Middle East is on the cusp of the EMV migration and Thales is seen as a trusted provider of the card personalisation and preparation technology that is a fundamental part of this process. We expect the uptake of Thales’ P3 to increase over the next 12 months as the business case for EMV migration in the region grows. This latest announcement is an excellent example of how banks are finding compelling business arguments for EMV beyond the reduction of fraud.”

About Thales
Thales is an international electronics and systems group, serving Defense, Aerospace, Security and Services markets. The group employs 61,500 people and generated revenues of 10.3 billion euros in 2004.

Operating in three main markets covering e-security, card payment and network security, Thales’ e-Security activities address the business, government and finance industries’ need for cryptographic security products and solutions. Over half of the world’s banks, together with the majority of the busiest exchanges, currently use Thales technology. For more than 20 years the company has been at the forefront of security and payment technology, co-operating and contributing to set the industry standards used for financial transactions and e-commerce globally. Thales e-Security activities offer a wide range of security solutions to protect Government and Defence critical information infrastructures, thereby positioning the company as a leading worldwide supplier of certified network security products.

About Verisoft
Verisoft is a software company specialising in electronic payment systems, smartcards, EMV and loyalty solutions with 50 people working in head office and two regional offices in Middle East and Central Europe . Serving finance, insurance and loyalty markets for many leading companies and banks, Visit Verisoft on the Web at www.verisoft.com.

Contacts
Claire Topping
Thales
+44 (0)1844 204156
claire.topping@thales-esecurity.com

Scott McLean
Hotwire
+44 (0) 20 7608 4643
scott.mclean@hotwirepr.com