USB Interface For SIM Cards Gains Support

Permalink: USB Interface For SIM Cards Gains Support

Support for USB technology for a proposed high-speed SIM has strengthened in advance of a vote by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute on 20 November.

Nordic telco TeliaSonera, KPN of the Netherlands and UK-based BT have added their support for the technology to that of Vodafone, Telefónica, T-Mobile and (Hutchison) 3, which have already registered for USB. However, France-based Orange and Telecom Italia Mobile of Italy are supporting a competing technology for the high-speed SIM.

Operators and vendors would welcome a new standard, which would help to significantly increase the speed of the communication link between handsets and SIM cards. The present standard is based on 20-year-old smart card technology, making large downloads to the SIM or support multimedia applications on the card impractical.

None of the proposed technology options have so far received the required majority of 71% or more of the ballots cast on the European Telecommunications Standards Institute’s smart card committee. The institute called a special meeting for November 20 in response to pressure from operators, card vendors, and other standards committees to resolve the situation.

Card vendor Axalto created the version of USB being proposed for SIMs and owns patents on the technology. It has been lobbying for its adoption as an interface and protocol since September. Operators supporting the proposal expect USB to give more connectivity with PCs. The main drawback is that it would take at least 18 months for handsets supporting USB SIMs to become available.

Handset maker Nokia believes the technology would add cost and complexity to handset chipsets and is supporting another option - ‘Multi-Protocol Interface’. This bases the high-speed SIM on standard smart card technology, but greatly increases data speeds. It could support USB and other IT protocols.

Orange and TIM are supporting a further option - MMC - an interface used on many flash memory cards in mobile phones. It offers a much faster time to market than USB, but there are patent-issues which could take the option out of contention.