Idex Biometrics and European semiconductor leader partner to produce smart cards

Idex Biometrics has reached an agreement with what the company describes as one of the largest semiconductor providers in Europe to build a complete solution for biometric smart cards.

The largest semiconductor companies in Europe include NXP Semiconductors, Infineon Technologies, and STMicroelectronics.

The Idex TrustedBio fingerprint sensor solution and full stack of biometric software will be combined with the new partner’s secure element, card operating system, and payment applets. STMicroelectronics won an award for its biometric card platform at CES 2022.

The partners intend to achieve full certification to all global payment networks. The integration eliminates the need other cards have for a separate microcontroller ASIC and separate power management circuits, according to the announcement, to cut manufacturing cost and complexity.

The unidentified partner will collaborate on joint development and commercial engagement under the agreement.

“This is an important milestone for IDEX as we can now offer joint solutions with two of the largest semiconductor suppliers to the payment card industry,” states Idex Biometrics CEO Vince Graziani. “We will provide card makers, issuers and banks a high performance, low cost, fully certified biometric card solution, further strengthening the ecosystem to meet increasing demand for secure and seamless payment experiences.”

The partners will make engineering samples available to card manufacturers from the first quarter of 2023, ahead of a target of delivering biometric smart cards to issuers later next year.

Idex also partnered recently with G+D JV E-Kart to bring biometric payment cards to issuers in Eastern Europe and Turkey.

Article Topics

biometric cards  |  biometric payments  |  biometric software  |  biometrics  |  fingerprint sensors  |  Idex Biometrics  |  secure element