Ethiopia biometric ID card contract won by Madras Security Printers

Madras Security Printers Private Limited has been chosen by Ethiopia’s government to produce one million cards for the country’s digital ID project with a $300,000 bid.

More than 1.4 million Ethiopians have registered so far for the national digital ID, Fayda, reports Africa Intelligence (subscription required). The country’s population is 120 million, and the government is aiming for universal registration of adults by 2025.

Madras Security Printers will deliver pre-personalized cards, under the contract which the government began accepting bids for in June. The cards will be personalized to include biometric data for authentication to access a range of public services, and also perform identity verification for onboarding to new bank accounts.

The company was also recently selected to provide digital ID cards for Sri Lanka’s national identity system. That selection prompted data privacy concerns, and the process drew accusations of favoritism towards certain vendors.

In this case, Madras Security Printers beat out 10 other bidders, including Thales, Toppan subsidiary Toppan Gravity, and local firm Premier Switch Solution, according to Africa Intelligence. Savvy Information Technology, which struck a deal with BIO-key to distribute fingerprint biometric scanners in Ethiopia earlier this year, was also a bidder.

A separate data storage contract for the digital ID system is also being tendered, and Tech5’s biometric engine and digital ID issuance software were used in the pilot.

Yodahe Zemichael, executive director of Ethiopia’s national digital ID system, discussed the MOSIP-based system and its rollout plans in an interview with Biometric Update on the sidelines of ID4Africa 2022.

Article Topics

biometrics  |  contract  |  digital ID cards  |  digital identity  |  Ethiopia  |  identity document  |  Madras Security Printers  |  national ID