Digimarc Corp. has won a $9 million contract to supply the Baltic nation of Latvia with driver's licenses

Under the terms of the five-year deal with the Road Traffic Safety Directorate of Latvia, Tualatin-based Digimarc will be responsible for design, installation, maintenance and servicing of the system. Digimarc will also be responsible for supplying materials and enhanced security features such as Digimarc IDMarc digital watermarking. Latvia is the first country in Europe to adopt IDMarc digital watermarking as a driver's license security feature, Digimarc said. Since being introduced in 2003, digital watermarking has been rapidly adopted as a driver's license security feature by nine U.S. states. Digimarc (Nasdaq: DMRC) provides secure driver license solutions for 32 U.S. states and in countries such as the United Kingdom, Russia, New Zealand, the Philippines and Costa Rica, as well as several Canadian provinces. Digimarc's preliminary financial results, released recently, indicate that the company will close 2003 with about $85.5 million in revenue, based on the last three reported quarters and the company's estimate of $19 million for the fourth quarter. While this represents a drop from 2002 revenue of $86.6 million, the company anticipates earnings of 11 cents per share for the full year 2003, versus the loss of 50 cents per share in 2002.