Fingerprint Cards, Zwipe announce expansions of biometric payment card reach

Fingerprint Cards has unveiled a partnership with Taiwanese card manufacturer Beautiful Card Corporation (BCC) to grow its global presence in the biometric payment card market, just as Lebanese digital security company Inkript received a letter of approval that opens its biometric cards founded on Zwipe’s technology to Visa’s payment network. Idex Biometrics, meanwhile, took home an award for innovation at the Africa Bank Summit 2022 for its payment card.

Fingerprint Cards partners with BCC

Fingerprint Cards and BCC announced a collaboration to develop and launch contactless biometric cards for payment and access control across the global market.

An announcement from Fingerprint Cards says the two companies have created a biometric payment card featuring Fingerprint Cards’ T-Shape module, and plan for next-generation biometric payment cards that feature the second-generation of the T-Shape module with the FPC-BEP Biometric Software Platform for Access.

They will also cooperate on go-to-market initiatives like offering their biometric cards to manufacturers in BCC’s partner portfolio.

Peggy Wu, CEO and chairwoman of BCC, says the company chose Fingerprint Cards because of its technology with proven biometric performance and the efficient power consumption. She says the partnership will benefit banks, merchants, and consumers for contactless payments in the Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region.

“This will shape the future for the payment industry since the collaboration between Fingerprints and BCC will enable state of the art biometric payment and access cards globally,” says Michel Roig, president of payment and access at Fingerprints. “Enterprises and banks alike will now be able to offer secure and convenient biometric authentication for their payment transactions as well as for physical and logical access applications.”

In May, Fingerprint Cards revealed a partnership with Feitian to manufacture its biometric payment and access cards featuring the T-Shape sensor module and BEP software platform, while BCC has previously partnered with Zwipe.

Inkript, Zwipe biometric payment cards approved by Visa

Inkript has received a Letter of Approval (LoA) from Visa that grants its biometric payment cards built on Zwipe’s technology access to the global payments network.

Riad Itani, managing director at Inkript, remarks, “We are pleased to receive the Visa LoA allowing the issuance and deployment of our biometric cards anywhere in the world. This LoA also comes at a timely point with the strong interest from issuers in the MEA [Middle East and Africa] region to launch biometric payment cards based on the Zwipe Pay platform.”

Zwipe says in a press release that the approval addresses strong market demand for increased security and convenience through fingerprint authentication. Zwipe also received a Visa LoA for Zwipe Pay in March 24, 2022, which paved a way for smart card manufacturers partnered with Zwipe to obtain Visa certification for their payment card designs, the Norwegian company says.

Itani says it is also an “important milestone” for the company as it seeks to enable biometric solutions for the fintech industry in the MEA region.

Ramzi Saboury, general manager of Zwipe for Middle East and Africa, says, “We are pleased to see that Inkript, as the first card manufacturer in the MEA region, has now received the Visa LoA for their biometric cards based on the Zwipe Pay platform. Achieving this milestone has a very positive impact on the commercial rollout of Zwipe Pay enabled biometric payment cards in the region. On behalf of everyone at Zwipe, I congratulate the team at Inkript on this achievement.”

The two companies are past collaborators, with a partnership dating to 2019 which was designed to bring biometric payment cards to the market.

Idex cards earn innovation award

Idex Biometrics added an innovation award from the Africa Bank 4.0 Summit to its trophy cabinet, recognizing its biometric payment card.

The Summit hosted the Africa Bank 4.0 Awards to distinguish innovators in the fintech industry that are increasing access to finance in Africa.

Idex was awarded for ‘Best Innovation — Card Payment Experience.’ The company offers fingerprint sensor technology embedded in a payment card for safe and secure transactions.

In May, Idex and Verisoft partnered to commercialize Idex’s biometric payment solutions both in the EMEA region and globally. Idex also has sights on the Eastern European market for its biometric payment cards.

Article Topics

access control  |  biometric cards  |  biometrics  |  Fingerprint Cards  |  Idex Biometrics  |  Inkript  |  payments  |  Visa  |  Zwipe