Interview with Camelia Ivan – CEO of Trans Sped

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Romanian Trust Service Provider Trans Sped is an EU Qualified Trust Service Provider with more than 15 years’ experience in the field of digital signatures. Trans Sped offers CSC-compliant digital certificates that are eIDAS Qualified and cross-certified with the SAFE-BioPharma Bridge and the U.S. Federal PKI Bridge. In addition to that, Trans Sped provide qualified time stamps and qualified preservation for digital signatures.

Here, Camelia Ivan, Chief Executive Officer at Trans Sped, talks to the CSC blog about the company’s work, its partnerships and the benefits of CSC membership.

Please can you start by telling me about what Trans Sped is and what the company does?

Camelia Ivan: Trans Sped has been active since 2004, issuing qualified certificates according to European eIDAS Regulation. We operate several CAs, listed on the EU Trust List, providing qualified certificates on tokens or cloud-based. The company issues qualified certificates to Romanian and European market as well as to the USA market. Trans Sped was the first Romanian company providing digital certificates for electronic signature and starting with 2008 Trans Sped was cross-certified with Federal Bridge for providing digital certificates with cryptographic keys based on Cloud on the US market. Our certificates are recognized as trusted in EMEA and in USA by all members of the Federal Bridge and governmental institutions. I would also mention that Trans Sped is a pioneer in the field of cloud-based qualified certificates. In 2008, we deployed together with SAIC (www.saic.com) the first PKI issuing so-called “roaming certificates” – certificates in cloud, dedicated to SAFE-BioPharma members.

What services do you offer in terms of cloud signatures and how do these help your clients?

Camelia Ivan: We provide qualified digital certificates with cryptographic keys based on cloud, which has the same legal effect as the handwritten signature and according to European eIDAS Regulation (910/2014) it cannot be repudiated. Our qualified digital certificate are highly secured, the two-factor authentication  mechanisms based on  certificates have the high  level assurance and it is fully compliant with eIDAS  Regulation, European  Medicines Agency, DEA and  FDA 21 CFR Part 11 requirements. We also offer qualified timestamp, which is a digital certificate that confirms the exact time and date when a document was electronically signed and then does not allow any modifications of the document, as it becomes invalid.

What are the benefits of using electronic signatures and in what way are they used by your clients?

Camelia Ivan: Our qualified digital certificates are worldwide digital passports, as our clients can sign anything, from anywhere and on any devices (smartphone, tablet, laptop, computer). The qualified digital signature has the same legal effect as wet signatures. We help our clients to save time and money. The documents are signed in minutes, not days and clients save up to 80% from signing process.

What is your relationship to the Cloud Signature Consortium and how has this helped your business? What has CSC helped to bring to your clients?

Camelia Ivan: We joined CSC more than one year ago, and the CSC standard and technical specifications helped us and our clients with an easy integration with other solutions, such as Adobe Sign, and together to provide a great customer experience and increase the adoption of qualified digital certificates in the market.

You have recently announced a new collaboration with UniCredit Bank – what will your work with them consist of and what will you provide? How will the CSC be involved in this partnership?

Camelia Ivan: We recently launched a partnership with UniCredit Bank, introducing the qualified digital certificates in the bank’s current transaction packages. Thus, more companies will be able to access an essential instrument for digital transformation and more managers will save valuable time for things that matter more in business. The clients of UniCredit Bank will receive the documents through Adobe Sign and use cloud signatures to sign with our qualified digital certificates. CSC is part of this step forward as the integration between Trans Sped and Adobe Sign is based on CSC standards and APIs.

Why has UniCredit decided to work with you and why should other companies consider teaming up with Trans Sped and CSC? What do you provide that others may not?

Camelia Ivan:  Our partnership with UniCredit started in 2017 when we first provided qualified digital certificates for private individuals who are customers of the Bank. Since then, we have issued over 300,000 qualified digital certificates for UniCredit clients. This year, the Bank decided to take a new step, digitalizing customer relations with its corporate clients. Teaming up for this project was a natural development of our successful partnership. Our partnership with Adobe Sign, as well as CSC, APIs and standards played a major role for us, as UniCredit decided to use the Adobe Sign digital workflow for its corporate clients. From now on, it will be easier, simpler and faster for customers to deal with different documents in relation with the Bank. Moreover, companies can use qualified digital certificates to sign documents in relation with the Public Authorities or other partners.

You have also been working with companies in the pharmaceutical sector. What services have you been providing there and how does the pharma sector make use of e-signatures (in what area of its work are these used)?

Camelia Ivan:  As I already mentioned, in 2008 Trans Sped deployed together with SAIC (www.saic.com) the first PKI issuing so-called “roaming certificates” – certificates in cloud, dedicated to SAFE-BioPharma® members (www.safe-biopharma.org). Certificates issued within this project are used for signing laboratory tests, analytical results or medical records. From the very beginning, Trans Sped took part in the SAFE-BioPharma projects established by the biopharmaceutical industry to speed its transformation to a fully electronic environment by using digital identity and electronic signatures. We developed the first cloud signature solution – “Zero foot print roaming credentials” – for BioPharma community in 2008. We have over 10 years of excellence in Life Science projects and our Trans Sped digital certificates are fully compliant with FDA, EMA, DEA, 21 CFR Part 11. Trans Sped issuing Root CAs are published in EU Trusted List, allowing the validation of the signatures generated with these certificates as being qualified.

Can you give me any other examples of ‘success stories’ where Trans Sped’s services have helped a company/sector and transformed the way they do business in terms of using e-signatures?

Camelia Ivan: We have had many “success stories” over the past 15 years. One of the most important is developing an EU-compatible instrument that transforms a list of cross-certificates into a trusted list that is placed in a public online repository. It was a Trans Sped project for SAFE-BioPharma and the output is that a trusted list published on the SAFE-BioPharma website allows EU-based parties to trust the digital signatures issued and recognised by PKI US Federal. Recent changes to the SAFE-BioPharma PKI framework turned it into the first and only service to enable digital signature validation in both US and EU at a government-recognised confidence level.

What does the next year hold for Trans Sped? Are there any exciting developments on the horizon in 2020?

Camelia Ivan: I think we will witness a gradual diversification of services. Until now, when you said a digital certificate, you only think about the electronic signature. But there are many other services that can be offered. We have already launched innovative digital products. Trans Sped is one of the few to offer certified video identification solutions. I think it is important in this industry to be able to offer more customised, more personalised solutions. For example, we can offer qualified certificates with a single day or a month validity or a 3-year validity and price per signature. We can find solutions for both corporations and liberal professions. And this freedom offered by cloud qualified certificates provides us with a great ability to adapt to any domain, to any type of client and to any need one might have in this area of qualified digital certificates.

Click here to find out more about Trans Sped