Florida Today

An AuthenTec solution

Security sensor uses fingerprints to identify users

February 29, 2004
By Wayne Price

Melbourne-based AuthenTec, Inc., a few weeks away from announcing the sale of its 2 millionth semiconductor-based chip, recently reached another milestone of sorts.

American Power Conversion, a West Kingston, R.I.-based company that provides security solutions for a variety of electronic products, said it will use exclusively AuthenTec's TruePrinttechnology-based fingerprint sensors for its APC Biometric Password Manager.

American Power Conversion will sell for less than $50 a personal-computer access device using AuthenTec's technology. That could open the door to many more sales and mean more work at AuthenTec, which employs 55 people.

"That's a price-point that has really not been seen in this market before," said AuthenTec President and Chief Executive Scott Moody.

AuthenTec's chips are used in biometrics, a technology for measuring and analyzing the unique characteristics of a person's body such as fingerprints, eye retinas, irises, voice patterns and facial patterns, mostly for authentication purposes.

Devices such as personal computers and cellular telephones use AuthenTec's semiconductor chip to scan below the surface of a user's fingerprint to the "live layer" before access is gained.

That avoids the user having to memorize or write down passwords, which can be forgotten or stolen.

"Today, many PC and laptop users find themselves inundated with passwords for their e-mail, online trading, shopping and banking accounts," said Joe Loberti, general manager of APC Consumer Network Solutions Group.

"To remember all of these different passwords, many will write them down on pieces of paper, where they can be lost or viewed by unwanted users. AuthenTec's fingerprint sensor enabled us to develop the industry's first-ever sub-$50 personal biometric device -- an extremely economical and reliable solution that solves this problem."

As biometrics continues to grow, the company is ramping up production. That likely will lead to an additional 10 employees by the end of the year.

Trevor Prout, a spokesman for International Biometric Group, a biometric consulting, integration and research firm based in New York, agreed the below-$50 price-point is an important number, but it also presents some challenges for both companies.

"Their ability to drive down costs is significant," Prout said. "On the other hand, as these things get cheaper and cheaper, they need to sell lots of them in order to have a strong business model going forward."