RFID TECHNOLOGIES

Tandis is specialized in developing contactless smart cards equipments. Non-contact or contactless smart cards are the high-end of RFID technologies: They include writeable memory or microcontroller processing capability and their chip communicates with the card reader through wireless self-powered induction technology (106-424kbits/s).

The contactless smart cards are replacing the old contact smart cards that connect to the reading device through direct physical contact between the chip and the reader. With contactless smart cards, in the other hand, the chip communicates with the reader using RF and does not require physical contact with the card reader. The contactless smart cards have numerous advantages over contact smart cards: They are temper resistant, easier to use, and even more secure.

The standards for the contactless protocol for smart cards are ISO/IEC 14443 (type A and B) from the year 2001. There have been proposals for ISO 14443 type C, D, E and F that have yet to be accepted by the ISO standards committee. An alternative standard for contactless smartcard is ISO 15693.

Tandis also offers solution for dual-interface cards that implement both contactless and contact interfaces on a single card with some shared storage and processing.