IT systems and services company ICL Plc has announced a global alliance with Microsoft Corp. ICL, which bought smart card software company Product Technologies Inc earlier this month (CI No 3,515), is to develop applications for the just-announced Windows Smart Card (see separate story). Perhaps inspired by its new partner’s business practices, ICL says its strategy is to become the world’s number one supplier of smart card systems within the next three years. If all goes according to plan, the first application out of the new alliance should be a corporate campus system to provide individuals living and working in contained environments like a building or corporation with a smart card combining multiple functions. Some of these functions might be a electronic purse, physical building access and logical secure network authentication. Real-time employee surveillance also springs to mind. Whether employees themselves will rush to embrace smart cards with capabilities like these remains unclear.
