Up until recently, the applications embedded in a smart card’s computer system have been proprietary, with different applications running under different operating systems. With a current estimated 80 to 100 operating systems, a card issuer who wants to add or remove an application must create a new smart card for its customers. But now, researchers are developing multi-application operating systems that will enable several different companies to piggyback their applications all on one card.

“A Mondex [electronic cash] card used to cost around $7 to $8 to produce and that’s just for a single application,” says the head of Maosco, a smart card consortium. “But a multi-application smart card could be made for around $4.

If the cost is spread among several smart card issuers, then it only costs you $1 per user to issue a smart card.” Contenders in the multi-applications market include Sun Microsystems’ JavaCard, Mondex’s Multos (multi-application operating system) card, and Microsoft’s Smart Card for Windows, which will be included as part of the Windows 2000 operating system.

“When you start up Windows 2000, it will ask you to insert your smart card,” says the business manager for e-commerce at Microsoft UK, who adds that the company envisions a so-called White Card, a blank smart card that’s part of the Windows operating system. “It’ll only cost around $1. You take the card home, put it into a smart card reader and download the applications you want.”

(c) Financial Times