BlueBear, CIT Technologies Group in e-documents marketing agreement
Two Canadian companies join forces to benefit from increasing demand for e-documents
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada-based BlueBear Networks International (OTC: BLBR), a specialist in face recognition solutions, has entered into an international licensing agreement with Securegraphics, a division of Burlington, Ontario, Canada-based CIT Technologies Group, a company pioneering high performance digital security printing systems. Market trends make this agreement right. The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a UN agency, agreed in July 2005 that all 188 member countries must start issuing machine-readable biometrically enabled e-Passports. The ICAO standard specifies face recognition as the globally interoperable biometric for identity verification in travel documents. E-passports will thus contain digitized photographic images of the faces of their bearers — and just look at the numbers: It is estimated that 240,000,000 e-passports will be issued world-wide by 2008.
Licensing BlueBear’s technology will allow CIT Technologies to integrate it into its Secure Documentation Issuing System (SDIS), which is being implemented in many places around the world to satisfy the growing demand for secure e-documents.
CIT Technologies printing system is used not only for passports, but also for producing secure driver license cards. The agreement will allow BlueBear Networks to expand the market potential of its technology beyond its focus on law enforcement, where BlueBear’s Integrated Digital Law Enforcement (IDLE) system is currently being used.
Secugraphics is currently deploying the world’s first e-Passport system in Serbia-Montenegro, which is expected to become fully functional in early 2006.
-read more at Securegraphics Web site
