Malaysia will not buy Datasonic Technologies, the company that supplies the MyKad national identity card and the country’s passports, the National Security Council has confirmed, days after its parent put an indicative value of RM7.5 billion on the business.
The council said the Madani government had decided against acquiring the subsidiary, known as DTSB. Citizen identity data is a strategic national asset, it said, so security and national sovereignty take priority, and the matter is being regulated through a framework covering legal, financial, governance and security aspects. It added that the government would continue to assess strategies for safeguarding the identity of Malaysians, and that those strategies must provide the best value for every ringgit spent.
Parent company NexG had disclosed days earlier that the Ministry of Finance raised the possibility at a meeting on July 24, conveying the request verbally rather than in writing. The ministry asked DTSB to assess three scenarios: the compensation that might be payable if the MyKad supply contract with the Ministry of Home Affairs were terminated, an indicative price for acquiring DTSB outright, and an indicative price for a controlling block of shares in NexG itself.
NexG valued the subsidiary at approximately RM7.5 billion through a discounted cash flow assessment that weighed future earnings capability, projected cash flows and business sustainability. The company described DTSB as its crown jewel and said any disposal would leave the group without a core operating business and could affect its continued listing on the Main Market of Bursa Malaysia.
DTSB supplies the MyKad card and has been the vendor of Malaysian passports built to International Civil Aviation Organisation standards since 2012, and it supplied biometric e-gates for Malaysian border crossings under an earlier contract. It also holds the mandate for the new MyKad structure and for the MyTentera and MyPOCA credentials, with supply commitments running for several years, and its identity work extends to biometric systems using multimodal biometrics and facial recognition.
The new card has been reaching holders during a wider tightening of identity requirements in Malaysia, where regulators began enforcing social media age checks and advertiser verification earlier this year.
Sources: The Star
–
By the ID Tech Editorial Team
