Zwipe

Norwegian biometric tech company Zwipe offers payment card inlays to embed biometric and contactless authentication to cards and wearables. The company’s solutions cater to both biometric payments (Zwipe Pay) and access controls (Zwipe Access), and in January 2024, it reportedly shifted its strategic focus more toward Zwipe Access . Its “Zwipe Pay One” system, combines the functionality of an EMV chip, a microcontroller unit (MCU), and other components, into a single chip that includes a fingerprint sensor from Zwipe’s partner, IDEX Biometrics . Zwipe Pay One facilitates a range of enrolment solutions including sleeves, integrated card fulfillment packaging, and self-service mobile phone APIs (to be launched in 2022).

Zwipe has a global presence with offices in Norway, the US, and Germany, and a team-based across nine countries. In 2022, the company’s biometric payment card tech was endorsed by the central bank of Iraq in January, and approved by Visa and Mastercard in March and August, respectively. Moreover, several biometric payment cards featuring Zwipe also received Visa approval, including Inkript and TAG Systems.

Key customers and partnerships 

Zwipe has partnered with multiple card issuers to embed its Zwipe Pay One solution, including International Card Processing Services Ltd, Financial Software and Systems (FSS), NetPS , KL HI-Tech, Modularsoft , Silkways Card and Printing Ltd, Unicard , Beautiful Card Corporation , and Civix among others. ICPS has issued over 6 million cards across 22 countries (as of July 2021), while four unnamed issuers working with Zwipe (announced in February 2021) have collectively shipped over 150 million payment cards across Europe and Asia Pacific per annum.

Notably, in H2 2021, Zwipe received commercial orders amounting to USD 2 million (around 8x its 2021 revenue), to be primarily delivered in 2022. In October 2022, Zwipe received a commercial order worth USD 225,000, from an unnamed smartcard manufacturer, with shipments targeted for Q4 2022. The company claims this was a part of a larger order expected in 2023.

In October 2023 , Zwipe joined EMVCo as a subscriber, to be part of establishing criteria for performance and security, as well as frameworks for the approval and evaluation of biometric payment cards. 

Funding and financials

Zwipe generated NOK 3.8 million (~USD 0.4 million) in revenue in 2022 and reported a negative EBITDA NOK 96.4 million (~USD 9 million). The company has been listed in multiple stock exchanges (Oslo, Stockholm, and Nasdaq) since January 2019. Zwipe raised NOK 96 million (nearly USD 11 million) through a private placement in September 2020, which it intends to invest in expanding the business and accelerate Zwipe Pay One’s commercial launches.

In November 2023 , Zwipe, announced a rights issue to raise around NOK 35 million (~USD 3.13 million), to strengthen its financial standing for advancing biometric cards in payments and access control.