Chip security start

LONDON -- Intrinsic-ID NV, a vendor of hardware-derivedsecurity technology, has received 5 million euro (about $6.7 million) in around of funding led by Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH and joined byexisting investor Prime Ventures.

Intrinsic-ID (Eindhoven, The Netherlands) was formed in 2008as a spin-off from Koninklijke Philips Electronics NV (Amsterdam, TheNetherlands).

Intrinsic-ID's hardware intrinsic security (HIS) makes useof unique characteristics particular to each IC to derive encryption keys. Thecompany's technology was also called Physical Unclonable Function (PUF). Thisallows a device to generate a secret key only when needed and power down withno key present. The technology has been used to secure assets against cloning,tampering, theft-of-service and reverse engineering and has been licensed tocompanies that incorporate the technology in Smart and SIM Cards, automotiveand embedded processors, set-top boxes, pay-TV, networking, communications,FPGAs and government applications. It is available in all modern technologynodes and is scalable with silicon area, Intrinsic-ID said.

Pim Tuyls, CEO of Intrinsic-ID, said that the companyplanned to use the investment to scale deployment to the mobile payment andcloud services markets through a "rapid expansion of our sales, support,and engineering teams."

"We believe that Intrinsic-ID's unique solution has thecharacteristics of becoming a key technology for the Internet of Things andthat it is therefore of great strategic importance," said Claus Schmidt, managingdirector of Robert Bosch Venture Capital, in a statement issued byIntrinsic-ID.

This story was originally posted by EETimes.
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