MARKET AND STRATEGY

Reinforcing our leadership in secure authentication

Markets

Demand for secure and frictionless authentication continues to expand, driven by rising fraud levels, tighter security requirements and increasingly sophisticated cyber and identity threats, alongside a steady shift toward digital-first customer journeys. Several external sources estimate that the biometric authentication market is growing at around 20 percent per year over the coming years.

Within cybersecurity, identity is increasingly the top priority: attackers rarely ‘break in’ through systems - they compromise identities and simply log in. This is accelerating the shift away from passwords toward passkeys and FIDO-based authentication, where biometrics is a critical enabler to deliver both strong security and a low-friction user experience.

At the same time, customers are increasingly prioritizing solutions that are faster to integrate, easier to certify and simpler to scale – favouring platform-based offerings over individual components. Biometric technologies are increasingly adopted as they combine high levels of security with convenient user experiences across both physical and digital environments. This market backdrop supports FPC’s move up the value chain from sensors to complete biometric systems.

The biometrics and identity management market also remains highly fragmented, with many sub‑scale players and limited commercial reach. As competitive advantages of scale increase, this creates a compelling opportunity for consolidation and for providers with broader product portfolios and stronger go‑to‑market capabilities to win share.

Strategy

FPC’s execution is centred on three priorities: monetizing our assets and capabilities, driving growth by moving up the product value chain, and improving productivity through AI augmentation.

In March 2026, Precise Biometrics and Fingerprint Cards jointly announced a proposed merger of equals. The combination is intended to create a more complete biometrics and identity company, bringing together complementary hardware, software and identity solutions, strengthening commercial reach and positioning the combined group to pursue growth opportunities as the identity and security market continues to evolve. 

AllKey is central to our strategy. By delivering complete biometric systems rather than individual components, AllKey reduces customer integration effort and system complexity while enabling FPC to capture higher ASPs and greater wallet share. As the platform scales, it reinforces our shift toward higher-value, higher-margin solutions through:

• Existing Customer Migration: We already have over 50% of our customers on an upgrade path from sensors to AllKey systems. This shift secures our volume business while moving our value business toward more complex, higher-value system integrations that increase "stickiness" and long-term contract value.
• New Customer Validation: Beyond our existing base, the launch of AllKey and AllKey Ultra has catalyzed significant new customer momentum. This validates our system value proposition in high-assurance segments. New customers now represent approximately 50% of total pipeline, indicating a future expansion of our customer base.
• Transformed Unit Economics: AllKey systems deliver a 3x ASP uplift compared to standalone sensors. We are capturing a larger wallet share at a sustained 50-60% gross margin target as these products move into mass production in the second half of 2026 and scale throughout 2027 and 2028.

During the year, we broadened the platform with AllKey Ultra, addressing higher-security use cases through inclusion of a secure element, and launched AllKey Ultra FIDO with jNet Secure – a turnkey platform designed to shorten time-to-market for biometric FIDO tokens. We also continued to build momentum in India, including payment and access-related validations, and progressed our iris business through the partnership with Smart Eye, enabling more robust multimodal authentication and opening additional enterprise use cases. In March 2026, we launched the FPC AllKey Software Platform, a fully integrated biometric platform that enables customers to develop and run their own applications directly on AllKey devices, secured by FPC’s fingerprint authentication. This is an important step in our expansion beyond standalone biometric components into higher-value platform solutions, increasing the potential revenue per design win through deeper customer integration and longer product lifecycles.

Alongside product execution, we continued to create value through asset monetization, including IP licensing and commercialization of engineering capabilities. Looking ahead, we will further concentrate the organization around AllKey, simplify customer adoption, expand the platform offering and convert momentum into sustainable, profitable growth—while maintaining strict cost and cash discipline to fund the transition from sensors to systems. We will also remain proactive in asset monetization and evaluate selective, complementary non-organic growth opportunities in 2026 where these can strengthen our core offering and accelerate time-to-market.