China UnionPay and MasterCard Worldwide have signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) for the establishment of a mutually beneficial relationship to explore future business development.

Alibaba.com has entered into an agreement to acquire Auctiva, the leading third-party developer of tools for eBay sellers.

Shenzhen Card Intelligent Science & Technology, Chinese manufacturer of IC cards and electronic tags, is a new licence partner of LEGIC Identsystems Ltd, a leading manufacturer of contactless smart card technology for personal identification.

Longtop Financial Technologies (LFT) and Netezza Corporation have announced a sales and marketing relationship in China.

Yucheng Technologies Limited has announced a joint venture with NTT DATA, that will rapidly develop Yucheng’s E-Banking ASP into an unparalleled leader in hosted e-banking for China.

GlobalPlatform has announced that its first one-day card specification training session for 2010 will take place at the Tsinghua Science Park, Beijing on Friday 29 January 2010.

Eastcompeace has joined GlobalPlatform as an Observer Member.

Watchdata will be showcasing a suite of data security, smart card and mobile SIM chip technologies and latest applications at CARTES, Paris from 17-19 November 2009.

Hong Kong will showcase its extensive and creative use of smart-card technology at the World Exposition 2010 Shanghai China, according to Alan Siu, Deputy Secretary for Commerce & Development (Communications & Technology) of Hongkong.

Patsystems has selected VanceInfo Technologies to establish its new offshore development centre in Beijing.