Boston, Massachusetts–Arthur Blank & Co. has announced a partnership with INSIDE Contactless for the supply of its newly released L4 2.5G MicroPass® platform. As a result of this partnership American Banknote Corporation’s global network of secure card production facilities will be teamed with the industry leading provider of advanced, open standard contactless chip technology.

“The partnership between INSIDE Contactless and American Banknote will allow our global companies to be on the forefront of contactless technology and development. We believe this partnership will allow us to offer a global solution for contactless cards produced in all of our various secure card facilities. It will position us to serve our financial customer base with the very best in new contactless payment technology,” said John Ekers, VP of Technology for American Banknote. “This demonstrates our continued commitment to advances in new technology.”

“We are pleased to have been selected by American Banknote as a partner for the provision of MicroPass contactless payments core technology and expertise”, said Didier Serra, General Manager for North America at INSIDE Contactless. “INSIDE intends to deliver top quality products, support, and service to enable American Banknote to rapidly begin delivering contactless bank card products into the market. We look forward to a mutually successful 2008.”

With the recent announcement of Arthur Blank & Co.’s Tennessee card production facility being certified by VISA and MasterCard this partnership is most timely. “As we begin to enter the US secure marketplace we know that this partnership will add tremendous credibility to our offering. Offering the new MicroPass® L4 2.5G platform as the basis for our contactless bank card products will give us the ability to offer a complete solution to our VISA, MasterCard and DISCOVER customer base”, said Jake Jacobs, SVP of Sales and Business Development for Arthur Blank & Co. For our retail customers who depend on us for gift, and other pre-paid cards, this will make available from one company, a full suite of secure contactless payment and gift card solutions.”

About Arthur Blank & Co., Inc. Founded in 1934, Arthur Blank & Co. is a leading North American producer of plastic cards. Located in Boston, Massachusetts, Arthur Blank has the capacity to print up to 1.4 billion cards per year. Arthur Blank’s cards are currently being utilized as secure credit cards-Visa and MasterCard, bank cards; healthcare and insurance cards; private label credit cards; ID, security and access cards; membership and gift cards; and gaming and hotel key cards. For more information on all of Arthur Blank’s card products, visit www.arthurblank.com or call 617-325-9600.

About INSIDE Contactless As the only fabless semiconductor company focused exclusively upon contactless chip platforms, INSIDE Contactless is a market leader in Near Field Communication (NFC), contactless payments, and access control. MicroPass, the 2007 Sesames “Best Hardware” award winner, powers cards issued by more than 25 global bank card issuers. INSIDE Contactless is headquartered in Aix-en-Provence, France, with offices in Shanghai, Singapore, Poland, San Francisco, and Boston. For more information, please visit www.insidecontactless.com.