“It’s the latest sign of the escalating activity in the nascent biometric payment cards market.”

Fingerprint Cards technology is going to be used in Italy’s first trial of biometric payment cards, the company has announced.

The trial will be the result of a collaboration with Zwipe and Gemalto, whose card solution uses a sensor model from Fingerprints’ FPC1300 series. The sensor is designed to work with contactless Point-of-Sale terminals, and Fingerprints says it features “ultra-low power consumption”, according to a press release from the company.

It’s the latest sign of the escalating activity in the nascent biometric payment cards market. Near the start of this year, Gemalto and Zwipe collaborated on a trial of biometric card technology conducted by Mastercard in partnership with the Bank of Cyprus; meanwhile Fingerprints’ technology was used in a Visa trial with Mountain America Credit Union.

Following that, Fingerprint Cards announced that its technology was being used in another Visa-led trial in the Middle East, along with a technological contribution from Zwipe.

Biometric payment cards are expected to see some large-scale deployments in the coming year, and Fingerprint Cards’ leadership has indicated that this is expected to be a significant new business area for the company as it seeks to expand beyond the mobile biometrics market.

(Originally posted on FindBiometrics)