A new dual directional silicon-controlled rectifier based electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection device suitable for 12-V applications is proposed in this paper. The proposed device (NPEMDDSCR) is based on the embedded DDSCR (EMDDSCR) structure, in which the P+ electrode and P+ injection are removed from the inner finger. Compared with the conventional modified DDSCR (MDDSCR), its high holding voltage meets the requirements for applications. Com-pared with the embedded DDSCR (EMDDSCR), it has good conduction uniformity. The MDDSCR, EMDDSCR, and NPEMDDSCR are fabricated with an identical width in a 0.5-μm CDMOS process. In order to verify and predict the char-acteristics of the proposed ESD protection device, a transmission line pulse (TLP) testing system and a two-dimensional device simulation platform are used in this work. The measurements demonstrate that the NPEMDDSCR provides im-proved reliability and higher area efficiency for 12 V or similar applications. The measurement results also show that the NPEMDDSCR provides higher robustness and better latch-up immunity capability.