Fingerprint biometrics continue to find a home on an increasing number of smartphones. Today that proliferation continues with Fingerprint Cards AB (FPC) announcing a design win for its new mobile touch sensor, the FPC1021.
The design win is the first to be awarded to the FPC1021, which was launched in April. As the arena for biometric smartphones is highly competitive, FPC is unable to divulge the name of the manufacturer which the company describes as among the top five Chinese smartphone OEMs.
Mass production of the phone is planned to begin this October with a target sales volume projected at 3 million units. The FPC1021 was designed with mobile in mind, optimized for Android and Windows smartphones. It was built on the technology of its predecessor, the FPC1020, and is 33 percent smaller, meant for use in situations where design space is limited.
“We expect several more design wins for our touch fingerprint sensors during the coming months,” says Johan Carlström, president and CEO of Fingerprint Cards AB.
It is a position supported by FPC’s increasing number of offerings in this space. In May, FPC announced another mobile optimized fingerprint sensor, the FPC1150 which is designed to be mounted in a smartphone or tablet’s home button.
The competition in the biometric smartphone space is heating up as the Summer gets underway. Come September, Apple is expected to unveil multiple devices featuring its Touch ID solution, and Samsung has just recently announced its second smartphone with an embedded fingerprint sensor.
Mobile biometrics in general have also been receiving a lot of attention in the financial space recently. MasterCard has named mobility and biometrics as key factors in the success of its financial inclusion plan, while a recent report from Goode Intelligence predicts that biometrics will be going mainstream on mobiles in 2015.
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