Royal Mint has announced a new £1 coin, designed to be the "most secure in the world", is set to be introduced in 2017. The proposed £1 coin design is based on the design of the pre-decimalisation threepence piece or three penny, a 12-sided coin in circulation between 1937 and 1971.
The Queen's head will be on the obverse side of the coin. A public design competition will be held at a later date to choose the design for the reverse, or ‘tails’, of the coin which is expected to be introduced in 2017. The proposed new coin will be roughly the same size as the current £1 coin.
More than 2 million counterfeit £1 coins a year have been removed from circulation over the past few years, according to the Royal Mint, with 3 percent of those in use estimated to be forgeries.
The new £1 coin will be a Bi-Metal coin contain an iSIS (Integrated Secure Identification Systems) security feature - a revolutionary new high security coinage currency system developed by The Royal Mint.
iSIS enables not just coins, but the whole cash cycle to be more secure, protecting the public, vending machine operators, retailers, and the wider banking system.
Project iSIS is the work of The Royal Mint’s in-house technology team and involves the application of an existing security technology that has been proven over decades in banknotes. It is the first time that this existing security has been successfully embedded into coins.
iSIS is the culmination of a period of intense research and development by The Royal Mint’s in-house team, and has seen an investment of over £2m to date, with a significant amount more planned over the next couple of years as the iSIS technology is commercialised.
The Royal Mint’s Project iSIS received the 2013 Innovation Award from The Wales Quality Centre earlier this year.
The proposed £1 coin will be the most secure circulating coin in the world to date.
