Nigerian specialist smart card company, SecureID, the brainchild of the highly-respected entrepreneur, Kofo Akinkugbe, is once again demonstrating why it is a leader in its field of expertise. This month, the company has unveiled a new pre-paid solution to aid the seamless enrolment of members to the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) in Abuja.
According to SecureID, its proprietary online data capture solution, SIDios, is expected to aid the seamless enrolment of NBA members using the Access Bank prepaid card. According to a statement by the company, the recently concluded launch of the “Stamp for Lawyers” by the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) in Abuja, offered SecureID an opportunity to work alongside Access Bank to enrol NBA members for the NBA prepaid card. SIDios, a proprietary online data capture solution developed and powered by SecureID, was deployed during the NBA event for the enrolment process. The new online portal which allows for flexibility was customized for the Nigerian Bar Association for easy and seamless capturing of members biometric data, their photographs, as well as their signatures. Also integrated into the online portal is the option for members to pay their membership Bar Practising Fees. One of the advantages of the solution is to provide members with the opportunity to complete their form registration at their convenience from any computer with internet access”.
"I am proud to say that SecureID is a truly Nigerian indigenous company of global standard, 100 per cent owned by Nigerians with 95 per cent of its workforce being Nigerians.”
- Kofo Akinkugbe
In the last few years, the Nigerian card payments channel has recorded strong growth both in terms of volume and value. Specifically, market research shows that the card payments channel grew from 30.5 million cards in circulation in 2009 to 56.1 million cards in 2014, with a projection that cards in circulation may hit 81.4 million in 2018. According to the study, the growth has been hinged on Nigerian government’s efforts to move its cash-based economy towards non-cash payments.
As a result of this growth, SecureID Limited embarked upon a backward integration of smartcard manufacturing processes that led to the company building its first personalisation plant in 2006 using advanced technology equipment to personalize imported smartcards for various purposes across different sector of the economy. In 2008, SecureID took the lead to backward integrate into milling and embedding; a core aspect of personalization.
Minister of Communications Technology, Mrs. Omobola Johnson, noted: “Smartcards or cards with embedded chips are key to our digital existence. Consider the everyday uses to which we put various SIM cards, biometric identity cards, and debit & credit cards used in the finance industry. Increasingly they are becoming part of our personal and corporate staple. Preliminary estimates indicate that there are currently about 150 million active SIM cards, 110 million biometric ID cards, and 15 million credit and debit cards in Nigeria. As more financial inclusion schemes, requiring more bank cards are rolled out and the different States roll out ID projects, these numbers are expected to experience double-digit growth.
The Managing Director of SecureID Limited, Mrs Kofo Akinkugbe, says the company has the capacity and the quality of operational and administrative personnel to produce chip and PIN based smartcards that support payments and biometric identification, verification and authentication purposes. She says: “Our vision from inception was to set up a full local content end-to-end high security smartcard manufacturing plant from raw material stage to finished personalized smart cards, operating transparently and with integrity and the highest business ethics. We have had to backward integrate over two stages on the value chain to get to this final stage over the 8 years. I am proud to say that SecureID is a truly Nigerian indigenous company of global standard, 100 per cent owned by Nigerians with 95 per cent of its workforce being Nigerians.”
With a capacity to produce 200 million cards yearly, she added that local sourcing of raw materials and effective market analysis has assisted the firm in filling gaps discovered in the market while giving it the capacity to produce products that could serve Nigeria and other West African countries. She adds: “This state-of-the-art smartcard manufacturing facility aids the local production of SIM cards for the telecoms industry, bank payment cards and high security polycarbonate identity cards for the private and public sectors. This great effort is in line with the nation’s vision of actualizing local content production. SecureID provides turn-key solutions for the smartcard identity industry from project start, through design, manufacture and personalization to final card packaging/fulfillment. SecureID supports a wide range of card products such as EMV SmartCards, GSM SIM cards, Magnetic-stripe debit cards, Loyalty cards, Contactless dual interface chip cards, Multipurpose secure identity cards and Mifare cards.”