HID Global purchases Australian card manufacturer Placard

HID Global has purchased Australian card manufacturer Placard to grow its presence in the Australasia region, the company announced.

In the Pacific region, Placard is one of the top secure card manufacturers for government institutions, finance, transportation, retail and enterprise. The company has a wide portfolio of products ranging from driver’s licenses, bank cards, retail loyalty cards, monetary gift cards, public transport cards, health insurance cards and government IDs.

“Placard’s large installed base of customers in the Australasia region demonstrates the continued strength of secure cards and their relevance in the lives of millions of people every day,” said Stefan Widing, President and CEO with HID Global. “Adding Placard to the HID portfolio would expand our value-add services and enhance our capabilities for trusted identities, while striking the balance between offering a broad range of card solutions and providing customers with the choice of digital IDs as the next wave of the future.”

Placard delivers end-to-end customer experience with services including in-house design, printing, manufacture, personalization and distribution services, acknowledged by Visa, MasterCard, China Union Pay and American Express.

“Becoming part of HID Global will add innovative technology to Placard’s offerings, expanding our ability to serve customers in the Australasia region,” said Chris Nunis, CEO of Placard. “HID’s global resources, expertise and exciting vision is complementary to our focus on providing high-quality cards and services for a wide array of use cases. This next step with HID is a perfect fit in our evolution.”
Placard is to merge with HID’s Identification Technologies business area managed by Marc Bielmann, Vice President and Managing Director.

Recently, HID Global acquired PKI provider HydrantID for enterprise data and IoT security. After demonstrating its latest biometric and ID card products at the Smart Cards Expo 2019 in Delhi, India was identified as a major emerging target market for HID Global in 2020.

Article Topics

acquisitions  |  biometrics  |  digital ID cards  |  driver's license  |  HID  |  smart card  |  smartcards