Omaha tapped for Digital Defense headquarters

Omaha World-Herald
Published June 28, 2005
By Deborah Shanahan
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER
Reprinted with permission

A company that has developed a portable, self-contained security device using fingerprints to access buildings and computers plans to bring 25 engineers to work in Omaha.

Plans also call for opening a manufacturing plant that employs 65 to 75 people.

Digital Defense Group has signed a lease at the Millennium Plaza office building, 15858 West Dodge Road, to serve as the company's world headquarters, once the office is ready in August or September, said Steve Campisi, president and chief executive.

The initial employees, he said, primarily will be engineers from around the country who had been working on a contract basis, developing the device that the company plans to sell to control access to areas in buildings and to computers.

"We've offered them jobs located in Omaha, and most have accepted," Campisi said. Some were in Omaha earlier this month to tour the city and meet with real estate agents, he said.

Digital Defense recently hired Richard Ouaknine, formerly of the International Biometric Group, to serve as vice president, business development director.

Digital Defense is a sister company to Data Flo, an Omaha company that Campisi also founded in 1984 to sell inventory tracking equipment and services. He continues to serve as Data Flo's board chairman.

For the past 18 months, he said, he has concentrated on developing the patent-pending security device, which is the size of four stacked credit cards and is completely self-contained and wireless. Because the device doesn't require external hardware or software, it ensures the user's privacy.

"From enrollment to authentication, a user's personal data never leaves the biocard,"Campisi said.

The biocard, called Factor4, and a related product allowing its use from a distance, IronGate biocard, are more secure than the use of PIN numbers or passwords and "will revolutionize the security industry," Campisi said.

Because the card works only for the person with the proper thumbprint, the biocard is useless if it's lost or stolen, and its biometric information can't be used for fraud or identity theft, he said.

Campisi said that Digital Defense is negotiating possible use of the system with the U.S. Defense Department and that several Fortune 50 companies are interested as well. Digital Defense says the biocards are compatible with the contactless payment card system adopted by MasterCard and Visa.

Campisi said the biocard could have potential as a national identity card.

Digital Defense considered other headquarters locations and, in fact, three weeks ago opened a sales office on Fifth Avenue in New York.

He said he chose Omaha for the headquarters because he's a native, because Omaha is "in a good growth mode" and because the Peter Kiewit Institute "is phenomenal." He called the institute's information technology and engineering programs "a big deciding factor."

Millennium Plaza was chosen, he said, because he expects most of the employees to live in west Omaha. Campisi said the three-story building also suited the image the company hopes to project and has security systems he appreciates.

The building, completed in 2004, has perimeter cameras and other features, such as the ability to instantly change all security codes if a breach is detected, said Fred Scott with Coldwell Banker Commercial World Group. He represented the landlord in Digital Defense's 10-year, $800,000 lease.

Digital Defense Group

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