In the University Card Management Committee's Notice published on 23 July 2003 (Reporter 2002-03, p. 1201) announcing the introduction of the current standard University Card carrying a MIFARE contactless chip, the Management Committee also announced the optional provision of two other card types to support applications which had used the previous card: a TDSi card; and a card with a contact chip. The Committee noted that these arrangements would be reviewed if changes in requirements or technology adversely affected the system's value for money.
The Committee have recently reviewed the need for the two non-standard card types and have concluded that they should be phased out. Only two institutions now use the contact chip card and both have plans to replace it by the standard University Card. The Committee therefore propose to discontinue issuing the contact chip card with effect from the end of December 2006.
Whilst the TDSi card is still in active use by a number of institutions for building access control, this use is declining. The Committee wish to encourage this trend as the TDSi card is expensive and offers no functional advantage in comparison to the standard card. They therefore give notice that they expect to recommend discontinuing the TDSi card within approximately two years.
Further information can be provided by subscribing to the announcement e-mail list. To do this, please contact ucam-univcard-request@lists.cam.ac.uk. A newsgroup for discussion about the University Card can be found at news:ucam.univcard.discuss. Further details are available at the Card Office's website at http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/offices/misd/univcard/.