Franco-Dutch security firm Gemalto has been awarded the contract for the renewal of the Swiss ePassport, according to contract documents.A contract award notice between the Federal Office for Buildings and Logistics and Gemalto notes that the firm "had submitted the most economically advantageous tender", and "best met the qualitative award criteria materials".The documents state that the final value of the contract would be 148,000,000 Swiss Francs (US$150m)Last April, Switzerland published a public tender for its future passport family, with a general contractor sought to organise and deliver all the necessary technical equipment.Just three months earlier, Gemalto has signed a definitive agreement to acquire the secure document business from Trüb AG, saying this would reinforce its position in high security identification documents.According to the Swiss tender published last April, an average of 590,000 passports, of various models, will be produced per annum, with a maximum total of 11.5 million units.A main contract with the successful tenderer will be fixed for 12 years and optionally lengthened in parts, or as a whole, for a maximum of 5 years, resulting in a total contractual period of 17 years. The first central production centre of the Swiss Confederation must be based in Canton Bern and commence operating productively within 2 years after the signing of the contracts with the successful tenderer. A second, optional production centre may follow a few months later.In addition to this, the systems that are deployed in the cantons and Swiss representations abroad to enable the decentralised personalisation of the emergency passports are to be procured.The Swiss passport has been dubbed "the gold card" of citizenships to hold due to the country's wealth and status as a banking centre.

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