ID Card Centre, working with Cambridge University Library to issue new MIFARE® library cards

Cambridge University is undoubtedly one of the most prestigious education establishments in the world and their 600 year old library, housing over 8 million books is a vital, central resource to the students of the university and colleges.  Driven by a need to upgrade their student and staff cards to ‘smart’ MIFARE® cards, and realising that their current software or hardware did not support MIFARE® encoding, ID Card Centre were pleased to be able to offer a solution.

The Brief – A New Card Management System

When Cambridge University’s Library department needed to roll out new MIFARE® library cards, and discovered their existing system did not support MIFARE® encoding, they thought they were facing a very expensive and time consuming system upgrade.

However by working with ID Card Centre, who are experts in the fields of identity and access control, they were able to benefit from a cost effective printer and software solution which crucially, thanks to the company’s extensive knowledge of the system, could be tailored on installation to exactly meet their needs.

The Solution – Smart Card Encoding and Printing Understanding the complex requirements the University had was crucial, these included: printing and encoding multiple card designs linking to several databases including an Oracle database the need to update data across multiple systems MD Ben O’Brien recommended CardExchange™ Producer Ultimate Edition software, a modular card management software system, that can be adapted to suit various user requirements.  The Ultimate edition of the software supports MIFARE® encoding as standard and has the required functionality to fulfil the University’s complex card management needs.  To meet the printing element of the brief, Ben recommended a Magicard Rio Pro ID Card printer with smart card encoder, a British made mid-range printer ideal for medium range print runs and offering enhanced security features including the option to add a Holokote image to the card surface.

The Outcome – Quality, Price and Support Guaranteed!

As with any education establishment, price was a very important factor and obtaining three quotes was a necessity, so it was crucial that ID Card Centre were competitive on price.  By offering all clients a price match promise, whereby they will price match a like for like quote, Cambridge University could be guaranteed that in addition to getting expert product knowledge and support, they wouldn’t get a cheaper quote elsewhere.

ID Card Centre were delighted to be awarded the business and promptly attended the University to complete the complex install, which included exactly replicating the existing card designs.

The solution has proved so successful that two further systems have already been purchased with a further roll out across other areas of the University in the pipeline!