* : , enrollment, credentialing, document issuance. Growth: Decline from 65 percent to 47 percent of total market revenues.

* : Time and attendance, watchlists. Growth: From less than 1 percent to nearly 8 percent of total market revenue.

In the public sector, worldwide government mandates for integrated border management systems are driving adoption of biometrics for electronic identification programs, Most says. In the commercial market, she says, the main drivers will be the evolution of mobile phones equipped with near-field communications, which enable information sharing, service initiation and payment and ticketing capabilities.

"This will be a problem crying out for biometrics," she says, "not only to lock the devices, but also to authenticate high-risk or high-value transactions." Tens of millions of mobile devices are already shipping with embedded biometrics, she points out. Similarly, another driver may be the healthcare industry, which may look to biometrically protect electronic health records, she says.

According to a recent survey by Unisys Corp., rampant growth of identity theft and new regulations mandating increased protect of personal identification information are driving acceptance of biometrics.