Samsung to Develop Smart Card Chip Based on Technology from Israeli OTI

Giant Korean company Samsung Electronics and OTI of Rosh Pina announced today they had signed an agreement for cooperation in developing a new family of micro-processors intended for smart cards that work with or without contact with the card reader.

The cooperation agreement includes development and production of a new computer chip based on Samsung’s existing micro-processor, which is for contact smart cards, combined with OTI’s technology for non-contact connectivity. The interface of the new chip developed by OTI will enable it to be integrated rapidly into Samsung’s micro-processor. Samsung will be able to present a first version of the chip in the final quarter of 1998, and start mass production in the first quarter of 1999.

Samsung, one of the world’s largest semiconductor manufacturers, has been showing increasing interest in smart cards. "The new chip offers a strategic solution for a multi-application electronic wallet with a high data security capability," said Chili Chung, manager of Samsung’s smart card micro-processor development team. Chung said OTI’s technology was the most advanced of its kind, and the only one that had proved itself in the field.

OTI specialises in non-contact smart cards, and was responsible for making the technological breakthrough in the design of smart cards that work with and without contact, at the beginning of 1996. It did so by being the first to use the same standard micro-processor and the same secure operating system for a card capable of working with and without contact with the reading unit. The agreement with Samsung follows a similar agreement signed a year ago between OTI and French semiconductor maker Thomson-SGS.

Published by Israel's Business Arena on July 12, 1998