In The Boardroom With...

Ms. Isabelle Alfano
Event Director
www.cartes.com

SecuritySolutionsWatch.com: Thank you for joining us today, Isabelle and congratulations on the branding and success you, and your team, have achieved with CARTES. Please give us a brief overview of your background and a brief history of CARTES.

Isabelle Alfano: I joined the group COMEXPOSIUM in 1996, and for 17 years worked on the development of international trade shows. I joined the Industries & Digital division of the group beginning of 2011 to manage the CARTES shows and conferences.

Since its beginnings in Paris in 1985, CARTES has grown to become the world’s number one event in the industry, with 450 exhibitors and 140 conferences featuring international experts. The event is attended by 20,000 visitors from 137 countries who come to discover the latest trends and innovations (mobile payment, NFC, biometrics, M2M, etc.).

Since 2010, CARTES exhibitions and conferences have also been organised in Asia and in North America (CARTES Asia in Hong-Kong and CARTES America in Las Vegas).

SecuritySolutionsWatch.com: We read with great interest about the success of CARTES America 2013.  Would you like to elaborate?

Isabelle Alfano:  CARTES America is a new business event launched in 2012 and designed to promote secure solutions for payment, identification and mobile technologies in the large and dynamic North American market.

Patterned after CARTES in Paris, and now in its 3rd edition, CARTES America hosts top quality, three day educational program uniquely concentrated on North American issues for senior level decision makers. In addition, the show floor features one of the largest cross-sections of industry suppliers representative of the full supply chain.

This year’s exhibition and conference attracted over 2,200 attendees from 55 countries, with 136 companies exhibiting.  There were more than 100 presentations at 80 sessions, covering topics from “Mobile Wallet Wars” and “Commerce Convergence Going Mobile,” to “EMV and Security” and “NFC: Not Just for Payments.”

Sponsors and exhibitors for this year’s event included ABnote, Bell ID, Bowe Systec, CPI Card Group, Datacard, Gemalto, GET Group, HID, Mastercard, Morpho, Oberthur, STmicroelectronics and Underwriters Laboratories. Event partners include ABRID, ACT Canada, BayPay Forum, Eurosmart, Global Platform, Inc., Global Prepaid Exchange, Homeland Security Research, SIMalliance and Smart Payment Association.

SecuritySolutionsWatch.com: We are all looking forward to the upcoming CARTES Paris, November 19-20-21, 2013. With nearly 20,000 attendees, 435 exhibitors, and more than 170 speakers, this 28th edition of CARTES is truly a “must-attend event”.  What are some of the major themes and subjects that attendees will hear, see and learn about this year?

Isabelle Alfano: In a world where people are becoming ever more connected and where mobility is a major issue for companies and countries, issues relating to security, authentication and data protection are priorities for all solution providers. Mobility offers a number of opportunities for security, payment, embedded intelligence and digital identity players in particular.  
The central theme for this year’s edition of CARTES is "Building trust in mobile life". It has been divided into four sub-themes:

• Mobile Security: Mobile payment, BYOD (Bring Your Own Device), SIM card security, etc.
• Secure Mobile Commerce: E-commerce, m-commerce, payment security, interconnected retail etc.
• Digital Identity: Digital identity, authentication, partnering for digital trust etc.
• Smart Cities: Object identities, machine to machine etc.

These are strategic fields where security and trust are key to successful growth in the mainstream market.

Two specific areas within the exhibition, the “Mobile payment “ and “Smart shopping” areas, will focus on innovations and advanced technologies already conceived to meet users’ expectations of secured mobile payments.

This year’s country guest of honour is Brazil. With a population of over 194 million and sustained economic growth, Brazil offers many opportunities for major players in the card, identification and mobile payment sector. The demand for value-added services, EMV migration and identification projects have ensured its market growth in one of the largest Latin American countries.

For the 1st time, CARTES Secure Connexions Event will be held in conjunction with Milipol Paris the worldwide exhibition of internal State security for all public and industrial security professionals. CARTES attendees will have the unique opportunity to be able to visit this event in the hall next door in the same exhibition centre.

CARTES is also the World’s Premier Conference for Digital Money & Identification. The 1,600 attendees of this 3-day conference program will have the opportunity to hear from leading executives and expert and to choose from the following sessions:

• Your Future is Mobile, Trust it?
• Commerce Convergence, going Mobile!
• Digital Wallets & eMoney: what’s new?
• Electronic Government Megatrends
• Cloud Security & Data Protection
• Best Practices for Mpos Acceptance
• Innovation and Dematerialization in Prepaid
• NFC out of Payment
• EMV 2.0, the Breakout year!
• Brazil: Building Trust in Mobile Life
• Smart Cities: Embedded Connectivity and Intelligence
• Biometrics: Privacy and Security Concerns
• Micropayment & the Unbanked Countries

SecuritySolutionsWatch.com: CARTES exhibitors truly represent a blue-chip list of the most important players and innovators in the industry. Would you like to give us a brief thumbnail of your major sponsors?

Isabelle Alfano: CARTES Secure Connexions Event is the most comprehensive event gathering the leading companies in the digital security, card and identification industry.
The Smart Security Industry shows good growth perspectives in 2013. Shipments in 2012 were up 11% from the year before and we are expecting another increase of around 9% this year.

A major chunk of this market is captured by four companies, namely GEMALTO, GIESECKE & DEVRIENT, OBERTHUR, and MORPHO, four- long time exhibitors at CARTES. These companies have evolved from Smart Card manufacturers to Secure Payment and Digital Security providers, as have done other long-time exhibitors at CARTES: ABNOTE, INSIDE SECURE, WATCHDATA   …
Other leading exhibitors include:

• Identification: 3M, ARJOWIGGINS SECURITY, HID GLOBAL, NAGRAID, THALES, TRUEB AG, VASCO DATA SECURITY
• Card manufacturing, personalisation and issuing: ATLANTIC ZEISER, BÖWE SYSTEC, DATACARD GROUP, EVOLIS CARD PRINTER, MATICA SYSTEM MGI DIGITAL GRAPHIC TECHNOLOGY, NBS TECHNOLOGIES INC, ZEBRA TECHNOLOGIES EUROPE LIMITED
• Semiconductors: INFINEON TECHNOLOGIES, NXP SEMICONDUCTORS, STMICROELECTRONICS, SAMSUNG
• Mobile Payment, Payment Systems, POS and m-POS: AMERICAN EXPRESS, ATOS WORLDLINE, CREDIT AGRICOLE CARDS & PAYMENTS, MASTERCARD WORLDWIDE, MONEXT, MPOWA, SPIRE PAYMENTS, VERIFONE
• Test and Consulting Services: BARNES INTERNATIONAL, KEOLABS, COMPRION, FIME, GALITT, UNDERWRITERS LABORATORIES

CARTES Secure Connexions Event mission is to present in a most exhaustive possible way a traditional smart card offering but also all the new means of payment and identification.

SecuritySolutionsWatch.com: The SESAMES Awards is always an exciting part of CARTES as it rewards the most innovative professionals in the smart card industries and secured technologies. Please tell us more about recent winners and what we might expect to see this year.

Isabelle Alfano: Organized as part of the CARTES trade show, the SESAMES Awards reward the best technological innovations in terms of smart cards, digital security, identification, secure transactions and contactless since 1995. They reward the best projects in 10 categories.

The projects submitted are presented to 38 jury members, international experts recognized in their field, who choose the finalists and the winners of the SESAMES Awards, in total impartiality and confidentiality of entries, thus highlighting the most dynamic and most ingenious companies.

For the second time this year, the SESAMES Discovery will give an award to the best innovation presented by a start-up company.

The Winners will be announced during the SESAMES Awards Ceremony, on November 18th, 2013.

It is really too early to give anything away of the final results, as the deadline for submitting the projects is on June 30th. We can say that over the last editions, the number and the quality of applications submitted in the software category were very impressive, especially in the secure cloud computing area. The list of entries in the Identification/ID cards/Healthcare category had also increased substantially last year. And the number of applications dealing with NFC is always very high.

In 2013, the applications submitted will probably indicate that innovation around security for Identity, Payment and Mobility is a major concern for businesses and end-users.

Let’s wait until the 2nd October when we reveal the finalists!

SecuritySolutionsWatch.com: Thanks again for joining us today, Isabelle. Are there any other subjects you would like to discuss?

Isabelle Alfano: Thank you for giving me the opportunity to reveal the striking elements of this next edition. CARTES, Secure Connexions Event is the world’s most exciting card, payments and identification event. This annual industry-defining event brings together the worldwide community of innovator, beyond Smart Cards, to include Innovative Payments, E-commerce, Digital ID, Services and other sectors that are profoundly changing how consumers and businesses manage data and money. The 28th CARTES Secure Connexions Event, to be held from 19 to 21 November 2013 at the Paris-Nord-Villepinte Exhibition Centre, will be a rich event with a focus on mobile life. So we are really looking forward to the sector’s big event!