January 9, 2008—L-1 Identity Solutions has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire all shares of Bioscrypt, a provider of biometrics including fingerprint and 3-D facial recognition, in a stock- for-stock transaction worth a total of $44 million Canadian—a deal that provides L-1 with its first products in the physical access control market.
Doni Fordyce, executive vice president for corporate communications with L-1, said the company carries myriad biometric technologies—iris, fingerprint, 2-D facial and readers among others—prior to the deal, but it was focused on IT and logical solutions.
“The hardware and software that (Bioscrypt) uses for the enterprise market is an area we are not in, Fordyce said. “This opens up a tremendous new market for us.” While L-1 has been largely focused on its products to the federal government, Bioscrypt has been marketing security solutions to security end users, Fordyce said.
Dr. Joseph Attick, executive vice president and chief strategic officer of L-1, said the company will continue to support the physical and logical access initiatives that Bioscrypt started by bringing in a broader spectrum of capabilities. Not only does L-1 offer additional biometrics as part of its portfolio, it also provides some of the middleware needed to make physical-logical access a reality.
For more information, see the L-1 Web site.
