eGov-May-2010-[42-43]-De-duplication Solutions-Need of the Hour-Dr Sreeni Tripuraneni

interview section: identity management solutions

De-duplication Solutions: Need of the Hour www.4gid.com

Dr. Sreeni Tripuraneni CEO 4G Identity Solutions

“Proof of concept covers 45000 enrollments spread across 10 villages in two districts. The Proof of Concept is to validate the enrollment software, devices and processes being used for the UID. Another objective of proof of concept is to assess the de-duplication accuracy that can be achieved specific to Indian population and environmental conditions.�

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Please throw some light on your road-map for Identity Management Solutions? What are the various landmarks covered so far?

We plan to concentrate on the following verticals in the coming year: • Unique ID and De-duplication solutions for Governments • Enterprise Framework solutions to integrate various departments of governments • ID Enrollment and Verification services • End to End Identity Management solutions for Public Distribution System • Criminal ID Management Solutions for Law enforcement Agencies • Enterprise Identity Management Solutions for large Corporates • Consulting in ID management Space We plan to expand of our operations to other developing countries in Asia and Africa.

Landmarks of 4G Identity Solutions are depicted in the figure below:

4G designed and implemented the end-to-end solution for Ration Card distribution for Rayagada district in the state of Orissa. Tell us about the project learnings, what works and what does not?

• Government involvement and support to the project is the most important and critical to success of such projects • Design of fool proof application that gives no chance to operators to manipulate the application • Enrollment is critical to success of any biometric project. There should not be any compromise in ensuring

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that good quality biometric images are captured.

Operators’ training is what ensures good biometric enrollment Working in tribal and remote areas posed the biggest challenge to our project Iris based de-duplication has been cost effective, faster and more accurate than fingerprint based deduplication Involvement of local people in operations has helped us a great deal in overcoming many field issues Technology is only 20% but Project Management is 80%.

Are there any other Indian states where you are doing similar kind of projects?

Orissa is the first state to deploy the end to end Multi-biometric ID management solution for Public Distribution System. In Andhra Pradesh Iris biometric technology was introduced 5 years ago however the technology provided could not scale up after few thousands of enrolments and resulted in lot of duplicates and bogus ration cards.

We have won the contract in global tendering process for deduplication of this massive 5.6 crore biometric database.

We have successfully completed this project and has created a 4.7 crore Unique ID database after de-duplication.

To my knowledge this has been world’s largest de duplication project till date.

The government of Andhra Pradesh has already saved and is saving hundreds of crores of rupees due to removal of duplicate and bogus ration cards.

Looking at the success of Orissa project many state governments are realizing the importance of biometrics in building an effective delivery mechanism for welfare schemes. There are many tenders in the pipeline by different state governments for similar solution that we have deployed in Orissa.

Can you please elaborate on the role of 4G in ‘Proof-of-Concept’, the UID Initiative in the state of Andhra Pradesh?

We have won contract in global tendering process for providing Iris cameras and Fingerprint scanners to UIDAI. These devices will be used in the UIDAI Proof of Concept tests.

We also has been awarded the contract for providing solution and deploying the proof of concept of UIDAI in Andhra Pradesh.

This proof of concept covers 45000 enrollments spread across 10 villages in two districts. The Proof of Concept is to validate the enrollment software, devices and processes being used for the UID. Another objective of proof of concept is to assess the de-duplication accuracy that can be achieved specific to Indian population and environmental conditions.

How your identity management solutions have an edge over the other market players in the domain?

Having been in ID management space for the last 8 years, we have built our ID management solutions around needs of Indian conditions. In the process we have faced several challenges in making biometrics work for Indian rural populations and harsh environmental conditions.

We have successfully overcome these challenges by developing solutions in-house. Our solutions are not vendor bound and is interoperable across technologies, algorithms and biometric devices. Most importantly we have chosen to be partners with some of the world’s best technology providers in biometrics. Last but not least we offer cost effective solutions. We continue to innovate and always wants be a step ahead of our competitors.

What is the Government business share of your company with respect to its total business? What is your plan to increase the market share?

Most of our large scale projects are in the government vertical and more than 90% of our business comes from government domain.

As long as we deliver value to the clients, I believe our market share will automatically increase. \\ egov

may 2010

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