Gemplus
Setec acquisition approved by relevant authorities and finalized
Luxembourg, 2 June 2005, Gemplus International S.A. (Euronext:
LU0121706294 - GEM and NASDAQ: GEMP), the world's leading provider of smart card
based solutions, announces the closing of the deal for the acquisition of Setec,
one of the leading companies in the electronic passport business and security
printing technologies. All legal and regulatory procedures have been fulfilled
and, as of 1 June 2005, the acquisition was finalized.
This alliance is an exciting step in strengthening Gemplus' leading position
in the ID and Security market with major e-passport references including Denmark,
Sweden, Norway and Singapore. It will broaden the scope for future organic and
non-organic growth of the company and provide new technology while opening up
new markets and regions for both Gemplus and Setec.
"There are strong, clear links between the two companies, and only few
overlaps, which will make it easy to leverage each others' strengths",
comments Jacques Seneca, Executive Vice President, Identity and Security
business unit, Gemplus and Chairman of Setec, "Our customers and our
employees are enthusiastic about the acquisition as they can see for themselves
the complementarities in Telecom, Financial Services and, of course, in Identity
& Security, for each region".
About Gemplus
Gemplus International S.A. (Euronext: LU0121706294 - GEM and NASDAQ: GEMP) is
the world's leading player in the smart card industry in both revenue and total
shipments (source: Gartner-Dataquest (2005), Frost & Sullivan, Datamonitor.). It
has sold over 5 billion smart cards.
With security at its core, and 2400 patents and patent applications produced
by its innovative R&D team, Gemplus delivers a wide range of portable,
personalized solutions in areas including Identity, Mobile Telecommunications,
Public Telephony, Banking, Retail, Transport, Healthcare, WLAN, Pay-TV,
e-government, and access control.
Gemplus' revenue in 2004 was 865 million Euros.
www.gemplus.com
For more information
Remi Calvet
Senior Vice President, Corporate Communications
Mobile tel: +33(0)622728158
remi.calvet@gemplus.com
©2005 Gemplus. All rights reserved. Gemplus, the Gemplus
logo, are trademarks and service marks of Gemplus S.A. and are registered in
certain countries. All other trademarks and service marks, whether registered or
not in specific countries, are the property of their respective owners.
Some of the statements contained in this release constitute forward-looking
statements. These statements relate to future events or our future financial
performance and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties, and other
factors that may cause our or our industry's actual results, levels of activity,
performance or achievements to be materially different from any future results,
levels of activities, performance, or achievements expressed or implied by such
forward-looking statements. Actual events or results may differ materially.
Although we believe that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking
statements are reasonable, we cannot guarantee future results, levels of
activity, performance or achievements. Factors that could cause actual results
to differ materially from those estimated by the forward-looking statements
contained in this release include, but are not limited to: trends in wireless
communication and mobile commerce markets; our ability to develop new technology,
and the effects of competing technologies developed and expected intense
competition generally in our main markets; profitability of our expansion
strategy; challenges to or loss of our intellectual property rights; our ability
to establish and maintain strategic relationships in our major businesses; our
ability to develop and take advantage of new software and services; and the
effect of future acquisitions and investments on our share price. Moreover,
neither we nor any other person assumes responsibility for the accuracy and
completeness of such forward-looking statements. The forward-looking statements
contained in this release speak only as of this release. We are under no duty to
update any of the forward-looking statements after this date to conform such
statements to actual results or to reflect the occurrence of anticipated results.
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