McLean tech firm Pangiam to sell to BigBear.ai for $70M

Columbia, Maryland-based BigBear.ai Holdings is acquiring Pangiam Intermediate Holdings, a McLean-based facial recognition and biometrics solutions provider for the trade, travel and digital identification industries, in a $70 million, all-stock deal, BigBear announced Monday.

The move will combine Pangiam’s technologies with BigBear.ai’s computer vision capabilities and allow BigBear.ai to expand its customer base and offerings to airlines, airports and identity-verification companies, as well as within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The deal is expected to close in the first quarter of 2024 and is subject to regulatory approval.

BigBear.ai has more than 20 federal defense and intelligence customers and 160 commercial customers.

“Vision AI [artificial intelligence] has long been considered the holy grail of applied AI because of its potential to perceive and interact with the world in a human way,” BigBear.ai CEO Mandy Long said in a statement. “BigBear.ai’s acquisition of Pangiam will create a full-vision AI portfolio — among the first in the industry — leveraging near-field vision AI in support of localized environments and far-field vision AI in support of global-scale environments.”

Pangiam was created in 2020 by Boca Raton, Florida-based private equity firm AE Industrial Partners through the acquisitions and combination of Alexandria-based software company Linkware and Pangiam’s predecessor company, PRE. In 2021, Pangiam purchased veriScan, an integrated biometric facial recognition system for airports and airlines, from the Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority.

Gov. Glenn Youngkin announced in September 2022 that Pangiam would invest $3.1 million to expand its Fairfax County office and establish its global headquarters there, creating 201 jobs over three years. It was not immediately clear on Tuesday if the company would move as a result of the acquisition or if staff changes or cuts will be made.

“The combination of Pangiam and BigBear.ai will position our combined companies to vault solutions currently available in market,” Pangiam CEO Kevin McAleenan said. “With our shared mission and a complementary customer base and product set, our teams will be able to pursue larger customer opportunities, enhance our technology development and accelerate our growth. We’re thrilled to soon join the BigBear.ai team.”