Toppan Gravity to acquire HID’s Citizen Identity business: insider

Hong Kong-headquartered Toppan Gravity has reached a deal to acquire Texas-based HID’s Citizen Identity division from Swedish access control giant Assa Abloy, a source within the company has informed Biometric Update.

The source says Toppan Gravity will take control of HID CID in the months ahead.

The terms of the agreement have not yet been disclosed.

HID Global was acquired by Assa Abloy in 2000, before itself acquiring biometrics providers Lumidgm and Crossmatch. The company has been operated as an independent subsidiary, with its business divided between Citizen Identity and access control divisions.

The Citizen Identity division was born out of the acquisition of De La Rue’s citizen identity business in 2019.

Assa Abloy does not break out HID CID’s revenues separately in its annual report, but the Global Technologies division, of which it is part, reported 22.9 billion Swedish kronor (approximately US$2.2 billion) in its fiscal 2023. HID Global makes up about 70 percent of the Global Technologies division, the report says, though the largest of HID’s six business areas is in physical access control solutions. The annual report also acknowledges “significantly lower volumes in the passport business” for HID CID since the pandemic.

“In our recently published report on travel digital identity, we predicted further consolidation in the identity sector,” notes Goode Intelligence CEO and Chief Analyst Alan Goode in an email. “This announcement from Toppan Gravity and the recent announcement from Idemia on the sale of Idemia Smart Identity to the IN Groupe, and Entrust’s acquisition of Onfido reflects the acceleration of a trend that we have been seeing all year. Companies are scaling their portfolio with acquisition to reflect the hybrid nature of government issued identity, supporting both traditional document-based identity with digital identity. Expect more of the same in 2025.”

Toppan Gravity acquired Colombia-based card manufacturer Hogier Gartner & Cía a year ago, and subsequently formed the joint venture Toppan Gravity Ethiopia to produce the country’s biometric passports.

Article Topics

Assa Abloy  |  biometrics  |  digital identity  |  Goode Intelligence  |  HID  |  HID Citizen Identity (HID CID)  |  Toppan Gravity