MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif., Aug. 8 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- LaserCard Corporation today announced receipt of a purchase order for $15 million of LaserCard(R) optical memory cards for use in Italy's two national ID programs -- the citizen ID card and the new foreign worker ID card.
The foreign worker card program was mandated by the Italian parliament in late 2004. This is the first order received by LaserCard for this new program. Most of the foreign worker cards will be valid for two years and then will need replacing if the cardholder wishes to continue to work legally in Italy while, a smaller percentage, expected to be about ten percent, will be valid for only one year before they need to be replaced. Deliveries under the foreign worker ID program are scheduled to be completed in April, 2006. The Company anticipates that shipments of foreign worker ID cards will represent up to $5 million in revenues per year once the program is fully implemented.
The order for citizen ID cards follows the completion of two experimental phases during which LaserCard supplied more than two million cards. In May 2005, the Italian legislature decreed that paper-based citizen IDs can no longer be issued after January 1, 2006. Under the new purchase order, deliveries of cards for the citizen ID program are scheduled to be completed by LaserCard in December, 2005. The Company believes that full implementation of the citizen ID program will result in card shipments valued at approximately $40 million per year. The Italian government is currently planning for the entire adult population to have new citizen IDs within about six years. The citizen card has a five-year validity period after which the citizen will require a new card.
"We are excited that Italy is beginning the rollout of both ID programs using our highly secure optical memory solution," said Richard Haddock, chief executive officer of LaserCard Corporation. "We believe that the Italian government's selection of LaserCard optical memory cards as the platform for these important programs reflects the confidence gained during the two-year experimental phase of the citizen ID card, during which more than two million cards were issued to citizens. As the Italian government implements more of its distributed data collection and card issuance infrastructure, the programs will begin to take hold in more and more cities."
Developed in close cooperation with various agencies of the Italian government, the foreign worker card uses the same LaserCard optical memory platform and follows the same format as the citizen ID card. Each card contains a secure one megabyte optical memory stripe in which an individual's demographics, color facial image, digitized signature, fingerprint and other biometrics are recorded. These highly-secure LaserCards are also "chip-ready", enabling the Italian government to add an integrated circuit chip. The chip is used for the delivery of e-government services. The optical memory is present for fundamental card security and, by taking advantage of the Logical Data Structure standard for optical memory developed by the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), offers international interoperability at the level of the card's digital data. According to the Italian Interior Ministry, the citizen ID is already recognized as a travel card for border entry by some 32 European and North African countries.
The purchase order was placed by Laser Memory Card SRL, of Rome, Italy, a valued-added reseller of LaserCard Corporation optical memory cards and drives.
The Italian government undertakes an extensive security authorization and personalization process prior to issuing cards. This process includes multiple levels of government-controlled approvals between each stage of card production, registration, activation and issuance. The high data capacity and data permanence of optical memory are ideally suited for this process. Each approval step in the process will generate a digitally signed record of that step, including where, when, and by whom it was approved, which is then saved as a digital certificate onto the optical media of each card. Each subsequent step generates a new "digitally signed envelope" over all the previous steps. In addition, custom architecture built into centralized and distributed LaserCard Encoders helps protect the entire process from being compromised by criminal activity. These multiple layers of protection are designed to help make the card-issuance process highly secure.
About LaserCard Corporation
LaserCard Corporation (http://www.lasercard.com/) manufactures and markets LaserCard(R) optical memory cards, chip-ready OpticalSmart(TM) cards, and other advanced-technology secure identification cards. The company, headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., has sold approximately 30 million secure ID cards to meet the demanding requirements for border security, digital governance, and national identification in countries around the world, including the United States, Canada, Italy and India. In addition, the Company manufactures optical card read/write drives and develops optical card system software, card-related data systems and peripherals. The Company operates two wholly owned German subsidiaries: Challenge Card Design Plastikkarten GmbH, which manufactures advanced-technology cards; and cards & more GmbH, which markets cards, system solutions, and card personalization printers.
Forward-Looking Statements: All statements contained in this press release that are not historical facts are forward-looking statements made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 and are not historical facts or guarantees of future performance or events. Rather, they are based on current expectations, estimates, beliefs, assumptions, and goals and objectives and are subject to uncertainties that are difficult to predict. As a result, our actual results may differ materially from the statements made. Often such statements can be identified by their use of words such as may, will, intends, plans, believes, anticipates, visualizes, expects, and estimates. Examples of forward-looking statements in this release include the Company's estimates of annual revenues from card shipments once these programs are in full implementation and the implication that the Company will be able to deliver the $15 million worth of cards per the requested schedule. These forward-looking statements are based upon our assumptions about and assessment of the future, which may or may not prove true, and involve a number of risks and uncertainties including, but not limited to whether Italy is able to successfully roll out its card programs, whether the cards and read/write drives perform satisfactorily, whether Italy continues to use optical memory cards in such program, and whether the Company encounters card production difficulties in ramping up to historic volumes, as well as the risk factors detailed in the Company's Form 8-K, 10-K, and 10-Q filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Due to these and other risks, future actual results could differ materially from the Company's expectations. These forward-looking statements speak only as to the date of this release, and, except as required by law, the Company undertakes no obligation to publicly release updates or revisions to these statements whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise.
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