Madagascar has chosen 
Idemia and Thales as preferred technology partners for a new national biometric identity system, awarding a contract worth just over €18 million. According to procurement details reported by Africa Business, hardware provider Laxton will receive €12.2 million of the total for biometric enrolment equipment and related software.
Project scope within the larger PRODIGY programme
The biometric upgrade forms a key work package under PRODIGY (P169413), Madagascar’s World Bank–financed Digital Governance and Identification Management System Project, a US $140 million initiative launched in 2020 to modernise civil registration, establish a unique identifier from birth, and streamline government service delivery. Earlier procurement records show that several international suppliers—including Thales, Idemia, Veridos, Semlex and newer entrant Augentic—had competed for different PRODIGY lots as far back as late 2024. The new award indicates that Idemia and Thales will provide the core biometric matching and credential-issuance platforms, while Laxton supplies the enrolment kits used in field registration campaigns across Madagascar’s 23 regions.
Although the government has not released a detailed timetable, officials have signalled that the first phase will focus on enrolling adults who currently hold paper identity cards or lack any formal credentials. Over time, enrolment is expected to extend to births and other life events so that a single digital identity can be used to access healthcare, education and social-protection benefits.
Technology mix and expected impact
Idemia and Thales both bring extensive experience from recent national ID deployments. Idemia is currently helping Armenia roll out a biometric ID system by 2026, while a Thales subsidiary recently won an 18.9 million CHF contract to overhaul Switzerland’s automated fingerprint identification system, projects that illustrate each firm’s capacity to deliver large-scale solutions. Laxton, meanwhile, has supplied multimodal enrolment kits—including fingerprint, iris and face capture devices—to projects in Ethiopia, Mozambique and Honduras, experience that will be leveraged for Madagascar’s field operations.
The government expects the system to cut fraud, improve the reach of public services and strengthen election integrity. Civil-society groups have welcomed the prospect of a reliable legal ID for citizens currently excluded from formal processes, but have called for clear safeguards on data protection and independent oversight once biometric data begins to flow into the national registry.
Final contract signatures with Idemia, Thales and Laxton are now subject to World Bank “no objection” clearance, after which implementation milestones and deployment dates are expected to be published by the PRODIGY project office.
Source: Africa Business +
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May 15 2025 – by Cass Kennedy
