Mastercard Approval Clears Launch of FPC’s Biometric Payment Card Tech in Japan

Fingerprint Cards is marking further progress along the path to mass commercialization of biometric payment cards. The company’s Tokyo-based electronics partners, MoriX Co., has received a Letter of Approval from Mastercard concerning biometric payment card production.

FPC first announced its partnership with MoriX last July, indicating that the two firms would work together to develop a biometric payment card featuring Fingerprints’ T-Shape sensor. MoriX, for its part, was no stranger to biometric tech, having announced its own biometric smart card in 2018 and a biometric crypto wallet in 2020.

Now, Mastercard’s Letter of Approval appears to pave the way for MoriX to officially launch its biometric payment card in the Japanese market.

“Working together with an innovative company like MoriX, we can now produce, deliver and market biometric payment cards with Fingerprints’ advanced and proven technology,” commented FPC’s President of Payments & Access, Michel Roig. “Introducing biometric payment cards in this region offers great benefits for banks, merchants and consumers alike, as contactless payments in Japan continue to grow quickly.”

The news comes after FPC’s announcement in January that its T-Shape sensor module had been certified through Mastercard’s Fingerprint Sensor Evaluation Process. Fingerprints had sought the certification – which build on its previously establish compliance with Mastercard’s Biometric Evaluation Plan – in an effort to help its card partners “save time and money when launching and scaling second generation biometric cards,” Roig explained at the time.

Since then, Fingerprint Cards has seen a number of important developments in its biometric cards-focused business arm. The company revealed in April that two of Morocco’s largest banks would launch cards featuring its biometric technology, and it went on to announce a T-Shape-focused partnership with India’s Transcorp soon thereafter.

In addition, just a couple of weeks ago FPC announced that its China-based partner, Feitian, would launch new biometric cards featuring the T-Shape and FPC’s BEP software system.

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May 24, 2022 – by Alex Perala