As president and CEO at IDEMIA National Security Solutions, Patrick Clancey is leading the company’s efforts to deliver identity technology products, solutions and services in support of the defense, federal law enforcement, civilian and intelligence communities.
He helped establish IDEMIA NSS in 2017, has worked throughout IDEMIA’s global footprint and recently rose to the CEO position. We talked with him about the company’s offerings and its strategy for addressing the needs of the national security community.
Tell us first a bit about IDEMIA NSS?
IDEMIA National Security Solutions is the foreign ownership, control or influence-mitigated IDEMIA affiliate, supporting the national security interests of the United States of America. For over 60 years, our extensive hardware, software and services portfolio has driven consistent results enabling America’s defense, law enforcement, intelligence and homeland security posture.
What differentiates you in this space?
Without a doubt, our people, and our catalogue of intellectual property. Collectively, our staff has close to a 1,000 years of experience working directly with our customers on identity challenges. Most of our staff have literally “walked a mile” in our customers’ shoes or boots.
That manifests itself as a deep sense of personal accountability for our customers’ success. We see ourselves as partners with our customers; their mission has become our mission.
Our intellectual property across biometrics, access control, secure credentials and mobile identity are all second to none. We’ve pioneered biometrics capabilities with our partners at the departments of Defense, Justice and State, and are consistently rated as a top biometrics vendor by NIST. We’ve maintained secure credentialing programs and provided support services for State Department for over four decades.
We continue to innovate and bring new enrollment, mobile identity and secure access capabilities to customers like the U.S. Postal Service, DOD and beyond.
Any recent wins you’d like to highlight?
Our recent wins have demonstrated our ability to combine core biometrics, enrollment and credentialing competencies to deliver digital identity innovation to emerging customer requirements.
At USPS, we’re enabling more streamlined enrollment using a tablet product. The Army and Marine Corps have awarded us projects for our ID2Access solution to deliver an enhanced user experience for visitor enrollment utilizing biometric sensors, digital identity capabilities and artificial intelligence for installation entry/exit.
Where’s the potential for growth, and what’s your strategy for meeting that need?
Growth potential in this space is high. COVID has demonstrated the necessity for more flexible in-person identity transactions, and where possible, for transactions to move more securely online or become mobile-device enabled.
To meet our customers’ needs, we’ll combine our deep understanding of their current and future uses of identity technology with complementary components that maximize prior investments, all to enable secure enterprise identity transactions.
You’ve held various roles in the company. What does it mean to be named CEO?
I joined IDEMIA’s predecessor in 2013 and helped establish IDEMIA NSS in 2017 before returning in 2022. That means every day for the last nine years, I’ve had the privilege to work with a team that is the very best in the world at what they do. To return to IDEMIA NSS as CEO is an honor.
I’m proud not only to work with this talented team, but as someone who previously used these capabilities as an infantry officer in both Iraq and Afghanistan, I understand that we’re not just working on concepts or ideas, but delivering tools that on any given day an individual soldier may rely on to keep them safe.
What’s the biggest business challenge you face, and how are you addressing that?
An important topic impacting the entirety of this space is the responsible use of identity technology. IDEMIA NSS takes privacy, data minimization, non-attribution and other factors into consideration when building and deploying our products.
We work in partnership with our customers to leverage biometrics and other capabilities for the security of our nation, while preserving identity with integrity. Part of the DNA of IDEMIA NSS is our “privacy by design” ethos. It’s a core component, not just in IDEMIA NSS, but throughout all IDEMIA.
On a personal note, what makes this work interesting or satisfying for you?
Like many of my colleagues at IDEMIA NSS, I view my role as a natural extension of my time in uniform. It remains deeply satisfying to know that we’re supporting critical mission sets with our innovations.
I’ve had the privilege over the last 15+ years to see identity technology evolve to a point where its potential is on full display across security and commercial applications. The continued opportunity to contribute to some of that, while a member of the IDEMIA NSS team, keeps me going.