- Q. What is RoHS?
A. The European Union (EU) Directive on the Restriction of certain Hazardous Substances.
This bans the use of certain substances in electrical and electronic equipment products
placed on the European market after July 1 2006.
- Q. What are the substances
referred to in the RoHS directive?
A. Cadmium (Cd), mercury (Hg), hexavalent chromium (Cr (VI)), polybrominated biphenyls
(PBBs) and polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) and lead (Pb).
- Q. What is the difference
between lead-free and RoHS compliant?
A. While lead (Pb) is the most widely used toxic substance in electrical and electronic
equipment (EEE), the term "lead-free" is often wrongly adopted to refer to all of
the substances specified in the Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) Directive.
However, RoHS restricts a total of six substances. To be truly compliant with this
legislation, the presence of each of these substances must be reduced below their
proposed maximum concentration values (MCV).
- Q. What are the benefits
of the RoHS Directive?
A. The extraction of these raw materials and their eventual disposal can cause damage
to both the environment in terms of pollution, as well as to human health from occupational
exposure and exposure following disposal. The removal of these materials from production
will reduce the health risks of exposure, particularly for children, the elderly
and pregnant women.
- Q. What is Aladdin's
approach to the RoHS issues?
A. Due to concerns about the environmental impact of hazardous substances used in
electrical products, Aladdin is implementing a transition to Restriction of Hazardous
Substances (RoHS) compliance. Aladdin's RoHS policy and transition plan is described
in its RoHS
Conversion Plan. It generally sets the same limits for the six RoHS substances as
currently specified by the EU legislation. Aladdin wishes to protect and improve
the environment wherever possible and so fully supports this reduction of toxic
substances that could reach the environment when such equipment is disposed of in
landfill sites.
- Q.
What is Aladdin's verification standard for RoHS compliance?
A. Aladdin follows the RoHS Directive (Directive 2002/95/EC) defined by EU and considers
a product to be RoHS-compliant if the maximum concentration value is up to 0.1%
by weight in homogeneous materials for lead, mercury, hexavalent chromium, brominated
flame retardants (PBBs and PBDEs), and is up to 0.01% by weight in homogeneous materials
for cadmium.
- Q. What is Aladdin's
timetable for production of RoHS compliant products?
A. We plan to complete the transition to compliance before the July 1, 2006 deadline.
Doing so we help our customers fill their supply chain with compliant products before
the RoHS official start date. Aladdin will supply RoHS-compliant keys on these dates
with our standard lead time:
February 1 2006: Hardlock USB
May 1 2006: HASP HL, HASP4 parallel and USB, Hardlock parallel and PCMCIA
- Q. Is it possible to
order RoHS keys today?
A. Aladdin can supply limited quantities today (HASP HL, HASP4 and Hardlock USB)
with a lead time of 8 weeks.
- Q. When can I get samples
of RoHS compliant keys for testing?
A. Samples for all models and form factors of HASP HL, HASP4 and Hardlock USB keys
are available upon request with lead time of up to 8 weeks. Samples for Hardlock
parallel and PCMCIA units will be available in April 2006.
- Q. Will Aladdin replace
keys I currently have in stock for RoHS-compliant keys?
A. No. Aladdin will not replace keys.
- Q. Is the RoHS legislation
global?
A. While the implementation deadlines form part of EU legislation, the need to comply
will evolve globally. Japanese manufacturers have been reducing lead levels for
3 or 4 years and, in the USA, California has already passed legislation to fall
approximately in line with the EU timescales. It is unlikely that electronics manufacturers
will make RoHS compliant components for Europe and non-compliant components for
the rest of the world.
- Q. My company is based
in the USA. Does RoHS affect us?
A. If you sell your protected software with a hardware key to any member country
of the European Union, or if you sell parts or materials or software to companies
that then sell their products on the EU market, your products are likely to be covered
by RoHS. But even if your products aren't destined for the EU market, RoHS may still
be of concern. Laws such as SB 20 and SB 50 in California are already taking effect
in the USA, and many more are in the works in the USA and in countries such as China,
Japan, and Canada.
- Q. How will Aladdin
identify RoHS-compliant products?
A. All RoHS compliant products shipped from Aladdin or from our distribution sites
will carry a special RoHS version (5.x) on the product's label.
- Q. How does Aladdin
verify the materials from its vendors and suppliers are RoHS compliance?
A. To ensure RoHS-compliance of components, Aladdin requests analysis by a third
party laboratory, and RoHS-compliance declaration by the manufacturer.
- Q. How does Aladdin
distinguish between RoHS compliant and RoHS non-compliant materials during production?
A. We distinguish these by creating different part numbers. All our RoHS compliant
products are composed of components with RoHS-specific part numbers.
- Q. What kind of changes
has Aladdin made to its production lines?
A. Aladdin purchased a new soldering oven which supports the RoHS (high temperature)
soldering profile. In addition, for our products we are using:
- RoHS-compliant electrical and electromechanical components
(e.g. micro-controller, memory chip, resistors capacitors.)
- RoHS-compliant solder paste and solder wire.
- RoHS-compliant Printed Circuit Board.
- RoHS-compliant mechanical parts (e.g. screws plating.)
- RoHS-compliant plastic casing.
- Q. What is the difference
in terms of functionality between Aladdin RoHS and non-RoHS keys?
A. There is no difference in functionality whatsoever, and there is no need to make
any changes to your software or our drivers.
- Q. Where can I find more information
on RoHS?
A. Please refer to the 2002/95/EC Directive on RoHS.
- Q. Whom can customers
contact for more information about Aladdin RoHS products?
A. If you have any questions about our RoHS roadmap, please contact your local HASP
Sales representative.
- Q. What is WEEE?
A. Waste from Electrical and Electronic Equipment. Deals with the best available
treatment, recovery & recycling of electrical and electronic equipment. Legislation
became effective Aug 13, 2005. All EEE put on the market as from that date have
to be WEEE marked and have to be collected after the products end of life.
- Q. Why is the WEEE Directive
needed?
A. In Europe, over 90% of electrical and electronic equipment goes into landfill
sites - around 6 million tons of waste every year. Emissions to the air that result
are a risk to both health and the environment.
- Q. Are the RoHS and
WEEE directives related?
A. Yes. The WEEE Directive aims to raise levels of recycling of WEEE and encourage
products to be designed with dismantling and recycling in mind. A key part of this
is to make manufacturers and importers of electrical and electronic equipment responsible
for meeting the costs of the collection, treatment and recovery of WEEE. If products
are designed with this in mind, there is an opportunity to reduce these costs. The
RoHS Directive fits into this by reducing the amount of hazardous substances used
in products. This reduces the risks to recycling staff and means that less special
handling is required, again leading to a reduction in recycling costs.
- Q. How will WEEE from
Aladdin users be collected?
A. Aladdin is currently in the process of registering with the applicable European
authorities and contacting collective schemes. Once this process is finalized we
will publish a list of these collective schemes and their contact details.
- Q. Where can I find
more information on WEEE?
A. Please refer to the 2002/96/EC Directive on WEEE.
