France Telecom, Gemplus, Groupe Lagardere (Matra Hautes Technologies) And VeriSign Launch Certplus - The First Major Certificate Authority to Serve The French Market
PR Newswire - September 01, 1998 08:18
VeriSign Expands Global Affiliate Program With Leading French Companies
To Provide Comprehensive Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) Services
To French Market
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. and PARIS, Sept. 1 /PRNewswire/ -- VeriSign(TM), Inc. (Nasdaq: VRSN), the leading provider of public key infrastructure (PKI) and digital certificate solutions, today announced that it has formed Certplus, a joint-venture created with a group of industry-leading French companies -- France Telecom (NYSE: FTE), Gemplus, and Groupe Lagardere (Matra Hautes Technologies). Certplus will provide secure intranet, extranet, and e- commerce applications to the French market by utilizing state-of-the-art PKI, telecommunications, smart card, and system integration services; the result will be to provide secure e-commerce applications to French enterprises, government agencies, websites/merchants, and consumers. These digital certificate-based applications will provide Certplus' customers with greater confidence to engage in electronic transactions and communications over the Internet for such strategic applications as healthcare, government services, home banking, telecommunications, secure email, and transportation. With the addition of Certplus, VeriSign expands the VeriSign Trust Network -- its global network of PKI service providers which already includes key partners in North America, Asia, and Europe.
The growth of the Internet has allowed enterprises worldwide to lower their costs while simultaneously increasing their reach when performing transactions or communicating with customers, employees, and business partners. However, security remains a key concern for these organizations. VeriSign PKI solutions provide significantly stronger security for access control than user names and passwords; serve as non-forgeable electronic identity badges for users to access privileged corporate data via the Internet; and provide confidentiality for internal and external communications by enabling users to digitally sign and encrypt email messages. The creation of a national-scale certificate authority capable of serving the entire French market will enable French businesses to provide their customers with the confidence that private data is not being compromised using standard Internet protocols including Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) and Secure Electronic Transactions (SET).
"The creation of Certplus is a major milestone for European businesses and consumers as they take advantage of the Internet for secure commerce and communications," said Jacques Pantin, CEO of Certplus. "The combined efforts and expertise of France Telecom, Gemplus, Groupe Lagardere (Matra Hautes Technologies) and VeriSign delivers unparalleled technology and service capabilities to the European market."
"Widespread adoption of PKI is dependent on the participation and promotion of a wide variety of organizations who play a significant role in the daily lives of businesses and consumers" said Abner Germanow, a Research Analyst in the International Data Corporation's Internet Security program.
Each participating company brings specific expertise and support to Certplus that will enable the company to offer superior security solutions to the European market:
* Gemplus' leadership in smart card technology will provide Certplus customers with a portable and secure digital certificate solution. The Certplus alliance gives Gemplus increased opportunity to simplify such applications as public and wireless communications, financial transactions, loyalty, healthcare, electronic commerce, and information technology security.
* VeriSign provides Certplus with the VeriSign PKI Service Provider Platform -- an integrated suite of PKI applications, consulting, training and customer services, data center infrastructure design and certification authority practices, to build an international presence in France. French enterprises will be able to build certificate authorities that use digital certificates under their own private hierarchy or as part of the VeriSign Trust Network (VTN) -- the word's only network of interoperable certificate authorities and certificates.
* France Telecom has a large range of Intranet, Extranet, and Internet solutions for which Certplus services are a natural complement. With its Certplus affiliation, France Telecom will meet the end-to-end communications needs of its enterprise and consumer customers.
* Groupe Lagardere (Matra Hautes Technologies) provides expertise in security and systems integration and will give Certplus the ability to quickly and easily install and integrate digital certificate solutions for its customers. The addition of a digital certificate solution to its product and service offerings is a key differentiator for Groupe Lagardere in the European market.
"We're extremely pleased to participate in the formation of a national certificate authority that will deliver reliable high volume digital certificate solutions and services to businesses and consumers in Continental Europe," said Stratton Sclavos, CEO of VeriSign. "This announcement furthers our goal to align ourselves with leading international organizations to facilitate the use of digital certificates and PKI to secure transactions and communications over intranets, extranets, and the global Internet."
Using VeriSign's service provider platform, components of which are already deployed in the Gemplus facilities of Sarcelles, Certplus intends to offer operational services in all fields of electronic certification during Q498. Additionally, Certplus will offer a full range of PKI and integration products and services contributed by each founding company. Certplus already operates SET services based on VeriSign's SET products and services through Gemplus facilities in Sarcelles which have been audited and approved by Visa International.
France Telecom
Official telecommunications operator of the 1998 World Cup, France Telecom is one of the world's leading telecommunications carrier, with 1997 consolidated operating revenues of FF 156.7 billion, 33.7 million telephone lines in service and operations in more than 50 countries. In addition to local and long-distance telephony, France Telecom provides businesses and consumers with data, wireless, online, Internet, cable-TV, broadcast and value-added services. France Telecom held an initial public offering in October 1997. Together with Deutsche Telekom and Sprint, France Telecom created the international joint venture Global One, providing global, seamless voice and data services for businesses, consumers, and carriers. ( francetelecom.fr )
Gemplus
Gemplus ( gemplus.com ) is the world's leading provider of plastic and smart card-based solutions. Gemplus sells magnetic stripe cards, memory and microprocessor-based smart cards, smart contactless cards, electronic tags and smart objects. The company designs and markets software, development tools and readers. Gemplus also provides consulting, training and personalization services to deliver the industry's most comprehensive and flexible card-based solutions to its developers, distributors, partners, and customers.
With sales of over US$590 million in 1997, Gemplus employs more than 4,100 people in ten manufacturing facilities, five R&D centers and 41 sales and marketing offices located in 27 countries around the world. Founded in 1988, Gemplus has successfully implemented portable and secure smart card-based solutions to simplify applications such as public and wireless communications, financial transactions, loyalty, transportation, education, healthcare, identity, physical access control, pay TV, electronic commerce, Internet security, logical access control and information technology.
MATRA Hautes Technologies
MATRA Hautes Technologies is the high tech division of Lagardere (65,9 billion FF revenues in 1997 and over 45 000 employees worldwide). MATRA Hautes Technologies brings together creativity and technology to design and deliver the most advanced and complex systems in the Defense, Aerospace and Communications sectors. MATRA Hautes Technologies is the leading provider of high-end security solutions through its MATRAnet and MATRA Systemes & Information divisions enabling enterprises and organizations to use the Internet for their mission critical applications. Certplus certification services are one of the key components for the creation of this secure e-business environment. For more information, visit Lagardere's Web site at lagardere.com.
VeriSign, Inc.
VeriSign, Inc. is the leading provider of Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) and digital certificate solutions used by enterprises, Web sites and consumers to conduct secure communications and transactions over the Internet and private networks. VeriSign's enterprise PKI solutions are available through VeriSign regional account representatives, resellers, and global affiliates. The company's Digital IDs and Secure Server IDs are available through the company's Web site at www.verisign.com. For more information visit VeriSign's Web site at verisign.com.
NOTE: VeriSign is a registered trademark exclusively licensed to VeriSign, Inc. OnSite and VeriSign Trust Network are service marks of VeriSign, Inc. All other trademarks are properties of their respective owners.
SOURCE VeriSign, Inc.
/CONTACT: Kelly Brieger of VeriSign, Inc., 650-961-7500, or
ryan@verisign.com; or Amy Royer of Blanc & Otus, 650-404-0900, or
aroyer@bando.com, for VeriSign/
/Web site: francetelecom.fr
/Web site: gemplus.com
/Web site: lagardere.com
/Web site: verisign.com
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