UIDAI places $24.5-mn orders with L-1 Solutions

The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) has placed orders worth $24.5 million (Rs 110 crore) with L-1 Identity Solutions for finger and iris biometric capture devices for the initial phase of the UID programme. The orders include both Agile TP fingerprint slap devices and Mobile-Eyes iris cameras, both of which have been certified by the Standardisation, Testing and Quality Certification Directorate of the Department of Information Technology (DIT).

Some units have already been shipped and the remainder is expected to ship now through March 2011.

The authority had selected three consortia to offer biometrics solutions to it to capture the fingerprints and iris scans of the 1.2 billion population of the country. The three consortia are being individually led by Accenture, Mahindra Satyam and L-1 Identity Solutions that will have algorithm and system integration providers in them.

The biometrics will be provided at the cost of Rs 2.75 per person, almost 70 per cent less than what the UIDAI had expected (Rs 9). Each biometric service provider (BSP) will receive Rs 2.75 per de-duplicated identity.