QI Systems Inc. was incorporated July 4, 1978 as Jewel Resources Inc. with the initial purpose of natural resource exploration. In the late 1980's the company began its current mission to develop and sell technology related products under the name Magnatron International Corp. On March 17, 1994 the name was changed to QI Technologies Corp. and on May 23, 2001 it was changed to QI Systems Inc.

QI's focus is the design, development and marketing of payment terminals for smart cards. The primary applications are unattended point of sale (UPOS) systems such as soft-drink vending machines, snack vending machines, laundry machines (washers and dryers), pay-and-display parking systems, newspaper boxes, photocopiers, etc. In February 1997, Visa International certified the first SmartKitŪ unit (SmartKitŪ I) for use with Visa Cash stored value smart cards. In the Fall of 1997, SmartKitŪ units were installed in vending machines at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), Bronx Medical Centre in New York as part of the US Treasury's test of electronic cash card technology. As well, in September 1997, SmartKitŪ units were in vending machines at Chase Manhattan Bank in New York in support of the Mondex cash cards pilot program (Mondex is owned 51 percent by MasterCard International).

History in the making: The original SmartKit

These and other pilot-site tests proved to be invaluable to the cash-card and the vending industries as well as to QI Systems Inc. These were not small pilots; for example, the Bronx pilot involved issue of 25,000 Visa Cash cards for use at all operations run by the on-site Veterans Canteen Service. Certification and operational reliability requirements were stringent.

Another product, which required early Visa Cash certification, was Q-LinkŪ, a hand-held data retrieval unit for collecting Visa Cash payment records from SmartKitŪ payment terminals. An upgraded version of Q-LinkŪ is still used as an alternative to telephone line collection of Visa Cash transaction records, and other records for other applications.