Idemia contract with South Africa airport authority terminated

Idemia’s major contract to supply biometrics and facial recognition systems for South Africa’s airports has been canceled, after months of squabbles between the provider, its former local partner and Airports Company South Africa (ACSA).

A release from ACSA does not give a reason for the cancellation, stating only that it “has terminated the contract for Automated Border Control (ABC), e-Gates and single token project awarded to a French technology company, Idemia” and that “contract termination is in line with the conditions of the Service Level Agreement which allows for a 60-day notice period.” Idemia will be allowed to conclude work that is currently underway.

ACSA awarded the three-phase, 380-million-rand (US$20.8M) contract to Idemia South Africa and Infoverge Solutions in August of 2023, with big plans to leverage biometrics and digital identity across the airport network through Idemia’s ID2Travel biometric passenger flow facilitation system.

But cracks in the agreement began showing in July of 2024, when Infoverge filed a court challenge requesting that the contract be annulled.

Infoverge’s website describes it as a “level 1, 100 percent Black-owned and managed” company. The firm’s litigation claimed Idemia exploited Infoverge’s status as an exempted, Black-owned micro-enterprise in order to comply with the Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) requirements in ACSA’s request for proposals – then cut the local company loose after the first phase of the project.

According to a report from Sunday World, there are also rumors that an ACSA representative pushed Idemia to ditch Infoverge in favor of a preferred connection, and that Idemia execs tried to hide the 115-million-rand (US$6.3 million) price tag attached to Phase 1 from Infoverge and balked when the BEE firm upped its original quote by 44 million rand to account for its share of the total.

In the meantime, Idemia had lined up another local partner to fulfill its BEE obligations under the deal. Earlier in August, as purportedly unrelated delays began plaguing King Shaka International Airport (KSIA), Idemia told Biometric Update that, while the biometrics system was not yet live, it had commenced installation and expected no delays in deployment, including from the Infoverge litigation.

Accusations of meddling lead to suspension of ACSA CIO

Infoverge’s argument may have finally convinced ACSA to kill the contract – but the intrigue goes deeper than that. While the tender for the biometric eGates and passenger facilitation project was issued in 2022, documents surfaced showing that Idemia and ACSA had signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) around the work in 2021. This led to allegations that Idemia had unduly influenced the awarding of the contract, serving as both “referee and player” – which led to further allegations that Idemia’s trademarks appeared in the tender document, and that ACSA representatives had attended Idemia workshops in which the project was discussed.

A February report from IT Web quotes a statement from ACSA saying the 2021 MOU “did not constitute a binding contract or involve any financial transactions between the parties,” serving only as a non-disclosure agreement for information related to the biometric movement control system.” At the time, it denied any accusation that Idemia had meddled in its procurement process.

Then, a few weeks ago, ACSA changed course, announcing that a preliminary investigation revealed “prima facie evidence of wrongdoing in relation to the biometric and digital identity technology project.” The agency subsequently put its Chief Information Officer (CIO) Mthoko Mncwabe on what it calls “precautionary suspension.”

With the formal cancellation of the contract, it appears that the last stone holding the relationship between ACSA and Idemia in place has collapsed.

The story, however, is not yet done. ACSA’s release says “the biometric and digital identity technology project remains key to ACSA’s short-to-medium term strategy” and that “the company intends to pursue the project in the near future.”

It also notes that “ACSA remains committed to the best interests of good corporate governance, transparency, and fairness as we continue with an independent investigation.”

Biometric Update has reached out to ACSA for further comment.

Article Topics

airports  |  Airports Company South Africa (ACSA).  |  biometrics  |  border security  |  IDEMIA  |  South Africa