ImageWare Systems has acquired four US patents related to wireless technology from a private company.

According to ImageWare, these patents, combined with its existing foundational patents in the areas of biometric identification, verification, enrolment and fusion, provide a unique and protected foundation on which to build interactive mobile applications that are secured using biometrics.

The firm says it expects that securing these patents will accelerate and strengthen its entry into the mobile transaction marketplace in sectors such as healthcare, law enforcement, banking and retail, or for any organisation requiring highly-reliable and flexible identity verification of their mobile users.

The patents cover a method for exchanging content-rich interactive messages via wireless devices, where a sender selects a template for negotiating an event-based interactive workflow and collaborates with one or more recipients. The event-based interactive workflow may involve response-triggered events and non-response triggered events. Information is pushed in real time to recipients using any enabling push technology. The message notifies recipients to take a particular action.

ImageWare used a cashless transaction combined with potential future cash royalty payments to pay for the patents. The cashless portion involved the issuance of 150,000 warrants to purchase ImageWare common stock, exercisable at US$0.80 per share. Under the terms of the purchase agreement, the warrants cannot be exercised until or unless ImageWare realises a minimum of $500,000 in revenue from the patents. The warrants last three years. The royalty payment to the seller would equal 7.5% of any revenue ImageWare derives from the sale or license of products involving the patents, with a cap of US$10 million.

“The addition of these patents to our IP portfolio significantly strengthens our market position as we continue our entrance into the mobile marketplace,” says Jim Miller, chairman and CEO, ImageWare Systems. “Combining the technology underlying these patents with ImageWare’s biometric solutions provides the missing security link facing a growing number of enterprises and government agencies using mobile platforms to transact business or interact with their users.”

He adds: “We believe securing these patents also provides yet another substantial competitive barrier to entry, as we work to roll out related mobile security enhancements to our products before the end of the year.”  

Including these newly acquired patents, ImageWare Systems now holds nine patents with eight patent applications pending.