Smart Packaging Solutions (SPS) has announced that by the end of 2019, it will have delivered over 850 million eBoost inductive coupling platforms demonstrating that its technology is both easy to introduce and versatile for card manufacturers, allowing them to manufacture all types of cards with a single process.The payment card industry is experiencing at the same time a strong growth in terms of volumes and an increasing diversity in card characteristics. SPS eBoost® inductive coupling technology is perfectly suited to support card manufacturers in offering a high diversity of products to the card issuers while keeping their production costs under control, which leads the industry to have used over 850 million SPS eBoost® inductive coupling platforms by the end of 2019. Inductive coupling technology, which consists in using electromagnetic coupling between the antenna and the module (no physical connection between the chip and the antenna), is easy to integrate for all smart card manufacturers. They can keep on using the same equipment for contactless or dual interface cards as the one they have been using for contact cards, thus reducing their capital expenditures. With SPS eBoost® inductive coupling technology, card manufacturers are able to produce all types of cards: contactless cards, dual interface cards, hybrid cards and contact cards, using the same equipment and the same process. This fact brings them not only huge savings in terms of production costs, but also a simplification of their logistics, while allowing them to provide their customers with an extensively diverse offer. Besides technology, the banking card sector is becoming increasingly diverse and complex at the same time as financial institutions are always asking for more differentiation and a finer segmentation of their markets. Differentiation is needed even for entry level cards, with colored edge cards or non-ISO card formats that are easily produced with inductive coupling technology. Mid-range cards, as defined by the issuers, are using a variety of features such as metallic or non-metallic foil for specific artwork designs, transparent cards, colored edges, custom antenna (CAI®, Customized Antenna Image) or custom modules (CMI®, Customized Module Image), all of which are easily manufactured with inductive coupling and ensure card vendors will consolidate their margin levels. High end cards, defined by low volumes and high margins for card vendors, typically heavy cards or metal cards for financial institutions wanting to provide status symbols to their high end cardholders, are perfectly compatible with inductive coupling technology. Evidence is brought by the wide adoption of the inductive coupling technology across the smart card industry: the three leading card manufacturing industrialists all include inductive coupling technology in their offer while over a hundred smaller card manufacturers are also proposing the technology to their customers, the card issuers. This wide adoption of the technology combined with its qualities in terms of cost and versatility leads SPS to announce it will have delivered over 850 million inductive coupling platforms by the end of 2019, thus demonstrating the fact that the technology is mature and delivered in high volumes.StÉphane Livet, VP Sales Asia at SPS declares: "As payment card markets are at the same time increasingly diverse and increasingly competitive, card manufacturers, especially in the Asia Pacific region, realize that the only technology that brings them a total versatility while being easy to integrate and cost-effective is SPS eBoost® inductive coupling."
850 million inductive coupling platforms worldwide take advantage of SPS
