About us

Sean Kelly

Sean founded Smart Card Solutions Ltd in 1991 and managed the company from formation through to 2004, growing the business from two to ten employees; later as Technical Director he was responsible for the company's technical developments.

Sean takes a keen interest in Electronic Passports, having designed and implemented the world's first e-Passport as deployed by Malaysia in 1998 (US patent 6041412, www.uspto.gov/patft). His core expertise is in the secure implementation of embedded controller software for smartcards and similar security devices, specialising on software defences against penetrative, disruptive and side channel attacks.

Sean has wide experience of MULTOS, having been part of the original design team at NatWest bank, and of JavaCard, having been the technical lead for its implementation on four different sources of smartcard chips. He is also sits on the ITSO (www.itso.org.uk) technical committee, a UK government initiative for interoperable smartcard based ticketing.

Martin Strauch

Martin is an expert in smartcard applications for banking. Whilst working for NatWest Bank he was responsible for the MULTOS security architecture, security reviews and documentation for Mondex, the bank's famous experiment with e-purse.

Whilst at Smart Card Solutions, Martin was responsible for five EMV smartcard development projects for both issuers. Martin's fluency with the EMV and GlobalPlatform specifications has been key to quick and accurate implementation of card operating systems and payment applications and their eventual certification by both Visa and MasterCard.

Martin has wide experience of the ICAO's e-passport specifications (www.icao.int), Global Platform's JavaCard lifecycle management and ITSO's interoperable ticketing Standards. He was the technical support contact for AILO (www.ailo.org.uk) and the co-ordinating editor of their Codes of Practice.

Peter Cox

Peter has over 30 years experience in the credit card and smart card business - having worked in Europe, USA and the Far East.

His managerial experience and business connections complement the technical skills of the founders and he was recruited to the board in 2007 to help the company with its planning, strategy and marketing. As a former board member of the International Card Manufactures Association (www.icma.com) he has a broad understanding of the industry's requirements and brings invaluable knowledge and experience to the management at Digital Locksmiths.