NEW YORK–(BUSINESS WIRE)–#ameritrade–SmartMetric, Inc. (OTCQB: SMME): The estimated size of the market for biometric credit and debit cards is significant. While SmartMetric is not making any projections on the actual size of the market, a number of industry figures point to the outsized market size and potential.
According to EMVCo, who is a credit card standards body responsible for the licensing and rules governing EMV chips used on today’s credit and debit cards, more than 10 billion 1 EMV chip cards have been issued by banks globally.
SmartMetric contracted an independent consumer market research company to ascertain the potential consumer demand for a credit card with incorporated fingerprint biometrics. The survey was conducted in the USA of credit card users.
The questions and results of the consumer research survey are as follows:
1: Are you concerned about credit card or identity fraud?
Answered Yes: 80.1%
2: Would you pay for a safer biometric secured credit card that has a built-in fingerprint reader for your protection?
Answered Yes: 65.5%
3: What would you prefer to pay for a biometric fingerprint secured safer credit card?
Answer 1: $69.95 onetime charge for the life of the card (3 years) 60.2%
Answer 2: $8.95 per month (includes identity theft insurance) 39.7%
Given these research results and given the number of credit cards issued by banks around the world, it is a massively large potential market that SmartMetric has developed its product for.
The more than 10 billion chip-based credit and debit cards issued throughout the world have been issued by banks in order to provide increased card security. By now adding fingerprint biometric sensing technology used to activate the cards contact and contactless chip, it takes security for credit cards to the next level.
Interesting for SmartMetric and card issuing banks is that the consumer research is showing that bank customers are willing to pay for biometric credit card. This is based on the consumer’s desire to have a safer technology that aids in protecting against card fraud. For banks card customers, the concern of card fraud goes well beyond the financial loss they may or may not experience.
Card customers find the whole experience of having their financial safety violated unpleasant. It is a logical as well as an emotional reaction by consumers. The sense of violation along with the general concern for their financial safety is the main driving force as to why the research is showing so many existing card customers are willing to pay for a biometric card.
For card issuing banks, they also are advantaged by the increased security offered by biometric credit and debit cards, while at the same time being able to turn their cards into a revenue generating new source of income, making the credit card a new consumer device in its own right.
SmartMetric is the inventor and manufacturer of electronics that fit inside credit and debit cards.
The SmartMetric fingerprint scanning technology inside the card allows the user to secure their credit card using their own fingerprint. It also allows payments networks to be confident that the person making the transaction is indeed the person to whom the card has been issued.
Fingerprint biometric secured credit and debit cards by SmartMetric have been designed around the chip that has now become the standard on newly issued cards within the credit and debit card industry. Touching a small sensor on the cards surface causes a fingerprint scan that reads and matches the card users’ fingerprint in less than a second. Following a fingerprint match, the card’s surface chip is then activated allowing the card to work in a card reader at a point-of-sale terminal or ATM.
Touch and store read once technology, developed by SmartMetric for its biometric card, allows mass card issuing financial institutions to issue their cards direct to consumers without the need for consumers to come into a bank branch. This is an important feature of the SmartMetric biometric card, since most new card issuance particularly in the USA is done via the mail.
SmartMetric is a USA based company with sales and marketing partnerships in Latin America, Europe and United States. Engineering of the biometric card electronics is done in-house and is the owned intellectual property of the company.
SmartMetric has issued patents and patents pending surrounding its biometric card technology.
To view the SmartMetric Biometric Card please follow this link – Video of the SmartMetric Biometric Card. To view the company website: www.smartmetric.com
1 Data Source: 10 Billion and Counting: What the Latest EMV<sup>®</sup> Chip Data Means for Global Payments – EMVCo
EMV is a registered trademark of EMVCo
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Contacts
SmartMetric, Inc.
Chaya Hendrick
Tel: (702) 990-3687
ceo@smartmetric.com
www.smartmetric.com
