Samsung, LG To Roll Out Fingerprint Scanning In 2014

Despite the fact that complaints continue mounting against the “game changing” fingerprint scanner built into the iPhone 5s, it looks like the feature will soon be baked into a number of non-iOS devices.

Sweden-based Fingerprint Cards says it hopes to license its identity technology to companies like Samsung and LG and bring fingerprint scanning to the Android and Windows platform. 

"I think at least seven or eight will launch a phone with a touch sensor in 2014," Johan Carlstrom, Fingerprint's chief executive officer, told Reuters in an interview. "Samsung is well known for having multiple suppliers for most components and our goal is to be selected as one of their sensor suppliers already in 2014."

Carlstrom says Samsung will launch as many as two devices in 2014 featuring either a swipe or touch fingerprint scanner. It remains to be seen if these devices will confound users as much as the iPhone 5s seems to be.

"It was an industry breakthrough and certainly opens the flood gates and starts a new industry," Carlstrom said. "We are just at the beginning of the growth phase."

While the vast majority of Fingerprint Card’s business had come from the sale of biometric security solutions to Chinese banks, this changed in 2013, with over half of the firm’s revenue derived from the mobile phone market.

According to Reuters, Fingerprint Cards is one of the few biometrics firms in the world specializing in touch sensors. Its chief competitors were AuthenTec and Validity, purchased by Apple and Synaptics, respectively.

Earlier this year, it was reported that Fingerprint Cards, which has a current market capitalization of $488 million, had agreed to sell itself to Samsung for $650 million. The story turned out to be a hoax, though.

"We have no intention to sell at the current time, and at current valuations," Carlstrom said.

At any rate, a fingerprint scanner on the Galaxy S5 seems more and more likely. Whether it’s a good idea or not remains questionable.