Little history on Brahmarsk's team and what they have done in the past - OCT 31, 2003 will be long etched on the minds of most Malaysians. It was
Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamed's final day as Prime Minister after holding office
for a record 22 years. But not many would have noticed that when Dr
Mahathir clocked out of the Prime Minister's Office on that day, he didn't
punch a card or sign his name in a book. Instead, he placed his thumb on a
scanner machine that uses the high-tech Karsof Fingerprint Technology
(KFT). Similarly, on Nov 3, 2003, when Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi
took office as the new premier, he used the scanner machine to clock in.
Interestingly, KFT was invented by a company based in Malaysia,
Multimedia Glory Sdn Bhd (MGSB), and is registered worldwide as a
Malaysian technology. MGSB was formed in 1999 with the mission of
providing total security software solutions and in system design and
development for a wide range of industries.
According to MGSB's executive director, N.Srikanthan, the company's
formation in Malaysia was a logical step. After a stint as an ICT lecturer
in Tafe College, Seremban, Srikanthan ventured into the software
development industry in 1992. As with many other independent software
developers then, he opted to outsource technical work to specialists in
India. `That was a mistake because we suffered from a host of logistics
issues and service level suffered as a result,' he says. It was then that
the 42-year-old Indian national decided to invite his cousin, ex-college
mate and often business associate, Lalitha Kaleedhas, to Malaysia so that
a permanent base can be set up locally. Little did Srikanthan know that
The invitation would net him not one but two R&D scientists. This is
because apart from her husband, Lalitha also brought along her son
K.Karthik - a child software prodigy.
With the help of Karthik - who began developing software for commercial
use when he was only seven years old - the three-person R&D team was soon
creating cutting edge technologies. The company, for example, was one of
the first to launch biometric based products in Asia. Consequently, it
started to expand quickly. Srikanthan says MGSB has been recording 100%
revenue growth consistently since 2000. Its biggest deal thus far is a
RM4.5 million contract to provide the KL International Airport (KLIA) with
a biometric based security system.The company has since received MSC status and Ministry of Finance
registration. It currently has six patents pending. Its suite of products
is called Karsof(tm) (an abbreviation for Karthik software). According to
Lalitha, who is the managing director of MGSB, the company is involved in
many areas of development, including commercial application development
and system protocols (which include operating system and databases).
Its flagship technology is KFT, which incl5udes unique biometric sto
rage process that enables low fingerprint data storage size. Lalitha
claims that KFT is the only technology in the world that can store
fingerprint data in 16 bytes storage space compared to the industry
average of at least 256 bytes of storage size. This ensures the technology
works well in narrow bandwidth options, e.g. dial up line.
Lalitha says KFT's high performance identification algorithm recognises,
verifies and accesses data from any database regardless of size in less
than two seconds. `KFT is user friendly and widely accepted by end-users
because of its prompt verification and high tolerances to finger
conditions and other external variant to the system,' she adds. Nothighly secured premises such as the Prime Minister's Office, the Prime
Minister's residence and KLIA.
This ability to minimise storage capacity ensures that KFT based
application can be used to improve existing infrastructure within various
industries. Expect more secure ATMs and credit cards within the financial
sector. Areas within the government sector which can potentially benefit
from the technology are passports, ID cards for citizens, terrorist
monitoring and national security.
Based on KFT, MGSB developed the Karsof Total Airport Security System
(KTASS) in 2001. This integrated solution monitors and controls all
internal security management at KLIA. Among other things, it provides
biometrics access control to 26,000 KLIA personnel and also to all
visitors to restricted areas of the airport. It handles an average of
150,000 transactions per day involving staff, crew, pilots, visitors and
other airport pass holders.
Based on open architecture, KTASS is a system that can integrate with
other security databases as such airport blacklists and criminal
databases, even via narrow bandwidth. Interestingly, due to its KFT's
technology enabling the low data storage size, search capabilities are
fast and provide accurate results. Field tests, at the 2003 Asia Pacific
Australian Information Communication and Technology Awards (APICTA) in
Thailand recently, proved that search results for a 30 million-fingerprint
database took only 0.5 seconds for fingerprint matching.
Not surprisingly, KTASS has won a string of awards for its R&D work. At
APICTA 2003, it bagged the `Best of Security System Applications, MSC',
`Best of the Best Prime Minister's Award, MSC', and `Best of Security,
International' awards.
Most of MGSB's solutions, including basic components and systems
protocol, are developed in Malaysia. Karthik, who is CTO of MGSB, says
that in comparison, some of its competitors opt for external software
components when developing their suites. `Such practices will cause
problems to customers who might require new functionalities or added
requirements in the future,' he points out.However, this stated commitment towards internal software development
work has not translated into higher head count for MGSB, which stands at
10 core personnel. The company, however, hires additional manpower from
within and outside the country based on the project needs. The rational
for this is that the manpower turnover in the industry is high, and
therefore there is always the likelihood that coders will leave important
development work halfway. `So, we have strengthened our processes to
ensure seamless development work can be carried out by any reasonably
talented coder without a loss in efficiency,' says Karthik. The company
relies on its own Karsof standard tools for developing the application
software.
Competent technical personnel are handpicked from Malaysia and abroad,
and used on a contract basis. MGSB hired 35 technical specialists for the
KLIA project. As such, the overheads are maintained at reasonable levels,
allowing savings to be passed on to customers through a more competitive
pricing structure. The flexible product development model has obviously
been successful based on the number of patents pending products developed
by MGSB. Currently, there are six encompassing areas such as biometric
verification for electronic transactions over the Web, computer network
security, fingerprint authentication in large database, fingerprint
storage size less than 20 bytes, and application security with biometric
features.
The future looks bright. The company is due to launch two products withthe potential to become money-spinners soon - "Karsof Protection Shield"
and "Karsof Anti Piracy System". The first product is a security solution
and the second an anti-piracy system that, among others, protects original
CDs from being pirated.
The launch of these products is bound to attract more blue chip clients.
At present, MGSB's clients include the Government of Malaysia, Malaysia
Airports Bhd, Affin Bank Bhd, Oriental Capital Assurance Bhd, and Fujitsu
Micro Electronics (M) Sdn Bhd. Acording to Lalitha, talks are underway
with many interested parties from Australia, Sri Lanka, Thailand and the
United States for various solutions.
