ID management system developer going global

The surging global appetite for digital identification is offering Hongda Hi-tech Group Co Ltd, China's first manufacturer of ID management systems, "unprecedented" expansion opportunities to reach around 400 million people outside China, the company said.

Wang Xin, chairman of Hongda, said on the sidelines of the ongoing two sessions that the company has obtained deals to develop digital ID systems for Laos and Papua New Guinea, as well as 50 million digital licenses for Indonesian drivers.

"This year, we aim to enter three to five new foreign markets," noted Wang, who is also a member of the 13th Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference National Committee.

He said that it used to take the company two or three years to enter an overseas market, but now "Hongda is able to secure two or three foreign markets each year".

According to him, the company's flagship product, which focuses on population data management, has covered 900 million people in China and has been used by the Ministry of Public Security.

The company, which is based in Changchun, Jilin province, has also developed a wide range of fingerprint-activated products including locks, with the leading type able to store and recognize 99 different sets of fingerprints.

"ID data management is sensitive in every country. As a Chinese company, Hongda can win the deals because the authorities in those countries trust China," he said. "There was hardly a deal before China's economic surge and the implementation of the nation's major initiatives including the Belt and Road Initiative."

Last year, Hongda won bids for population management and biometrics projects from both Cambodia and Mali. It is also in active cooperation with several BRI economies including Myanmar, Mozambique and Uganda.

According to a report by Transparency Market Research, the global biometrics sector is growing at a rate of 20.8 percent annually and the market scale is expected to reach $23.3 billion over the next few years.

During the process of going global, Wang pointed out that Hongda has explored cooperation with Chinese companies from other industries to better localize overseas.

In some of the countries in which Hongda already does business, the firm has been helping Chinese companies from the energy, mining, finance and internet sectors to do business there.