Executive Director's Letter

Dear members and friends of the Alliance,

Have you ever watched a professional football coach or baseball manager being interviewed after the “big game” where his team hung on and won, despite giving up a big lead before they won it? It often happens that the coach wants to talk about the great moments when his team had all the momentum and everything was going great and how sweet the feeling of victory was at the end. The reporters, on the other hand, see things from a different perspective and ask what went wrong during the game that let the other team back in the game. That is sort of how I feel the post-event analysis of the CTST 2008 and Smart Card Alliance Annual Conference analysis is going. So let me get right to the end point – I think we hung on and won the “big game”. Now we can review the details of the “game” from different perspectives and points of view starting from that point.

Last month I told you the big question I was being asked was: “How is CTST coming?” Today, the big question on everyone’s mind is: “How do you think CTST went?” When I asked that question the responses ranged from “Not Bad,” Great” to “Fantastic,” but that doesn’t really say much. It all depends on what each individual’s primary interest was in the event and what those people most expected to get out of attending this year’s first-ever joining of CTST with the Smart Card Alliance Annual Conference. We initiated a survey of Alliance member attendees to measure their opinions more quantitatively. The Smart Card Alliance membership represented about one-third of the total event attendance. Since that number, approximately 550 people, is about the same number who attended last October’s Annual Conference in Boston, I would say that I was very pleased with the turnout. The larger majority, the more than 1000 other attendees who attended, did not come from Smart Card Alliance member organizations, so we don't know what their expectations for this year were. I am sure many of them have been long-time attendees who come for the exhibition and not for conference program. For those attendees expecting the same event as previous years, they might look at the slightly smaller number of exhibitors and fewer exhibit hall attendees and say that the conference was disappointing.

(Visit the CTST Photo Slide Show on our web site)

Don’t miss Contactless Cards and Payments 2008 - 23/24 June 2008, London - the leading industry forum ideally placed to bring you up to date with the international contactless payments market. Consumers are embracing the next generation of payment methods and banks and retailers cannot afford to get left behind. For more information click here.

Member Profile: Oberthur Technologies

This month, Smart Card Talk spoke with Garfield Smith, Vice President, Marketing, Americas Region for Oberthur Technologies. In his current role, Mr. Smith is responsible for product marketing, pricing for payment and government/ID products and services, creative services, marketing communications, and the project management office. He has over 20 years of marketing experience gained from Green Dot Corporation, the leading provider of re-loadable prepaid cards, Verizon Wireless, a leading wireless provider in the U.S., and General Mills, a leading consumer packaged-goods company. Mr. Smith has an MBA from Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University, and BA fromColgate University. He is active in the Smart Card Alliance, serving on the Board of Directors and Contactless Payments Council Steering Committee and chairing the Council's Consumer Awareness Work Group.

Feature of the Month 

Serving Unbanked Consumers in the Transit Industry

It is estimated that close to 20% of all American households—40 million households, representing 80 million people—do not have basic bank accounts. An additional segment of the U.S. population is composed of individuals who are considered to be underbanked. These underbanked individuals may have a basic savings account with a financial institution but do not use more advanced financial services, such as checking accounts, loans, or retirement savings accounts. A number of different factors play a role in why many individuals are unbanked or underbanked. In addition to economic status, several studies have pointed out that there are issues of language, trust, privacy, availability of appropriate financial products, and the cost of services that play an important role.

These large segments of the population create challenges for transit agencies who are implementing smart-card-based automatic fare collection (AFC) systems. How do transit agencies provide the same easy access for transit services to unbanked and underbanked riders, while also maintaining the benefits of reduced operating costs and improved efficiencies that AFC systems deliver in reducing the use of cash for fare product purchases?

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