It's all about RFID

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2009-07-24T18:12:00.001+05:30

testing .......

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2009-07-23T18:23:00.001+05:30

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vimala!

2009-07-23T17:46:00.001+05:30

test post

Tagging patients by radio transmitters...

2007-06-04T13:25:00.000+05:30

BANGALORE: When patients are admitted to the Out Patient Department of the Bhagwan Mahaveer Jain (BMJ) Heart Centre here, they are provided a special card fitted with a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) chip.

HEART AND BRAIN: The cardiac laboratory at the BMJ Heart Centre in Bangalore (left) is linked to the Clinical Information Processing Platform developed by Aventyn.

This helps the hospital keep track of the patient, via radio, as they move from reception to consultation and treatment rooms. The record of tests conducted, medicines prescribed, bills raised... are all available wirelessly in an instant at any of over a dozen stations, helping the hospital treat the patient, speedily and with minimum hassle.

The RFID technology — the use of tiny embedded radio transmitters to track people and objects — forms the communication backbone of the Clinical Information Processing Platform (CLIP) deployed at BMJ, a state-of-the-art hospital management system that has been developed by an Indian-founded, U.S.-based company, Aventyn.

The latest — version 1.2 — of CLIP, is one of the first of its kind in the healthcare industry, providing clinicians, health care providers and hospital administrators, with a single but comprehensive tool that links up "live" with the key element of any such operation: the patient.

The RFID is increasingly being harnessed to keep track of large inventories in warehouses and depots — but new and creative applications are enlarging its scope.

At BMJ for example, they tag not just patients but high value inventory such as pacemakers and stents as well.

In a special report on the CLIP deployment at the Bangalore hospital, Beth Bacheldor wrote in RFID Journal last week that over 100 patients were being tagged daily.

Satish Chandra, Director of non-invasive cardiology, is quoted as saying that the hospital's experience has encouraged it to extend the system to inpatient and intensive care departments.

The San Diego-based Aventyn was founded by Navin Govind, who has contributed key wireless technologies earlier at Intel and Tarari Inc.

In recent weeks, the CLIP solution has been widely discussed by RFID forums worldwide — and the experience in Bangalore will be closely watched by other potential user agencies worldwide.

Source : Hinduonnet

Report studies chipless RFID market potential

2007-06-01T16:59:00.000+05:30

Research and Markets has announced the recent publication of a report entitled 'Printed and Chipless RFID Forecasts, Technologies & Players 2007-2017', which shows how chipless RFID smart labels - which can cost much less than chip-based RFID tags - could grow from 0.4% of the RFID market in 2006 to as much as 45% of the market by 2016.

With cumulative sales of 100 million chipless tags to date (compared to 2,322 million chip-based RFID tags), chipless devices have the potential to grow to 45% of the market in 2016, the report says. Ultimately, the end aim will be for RFID to be almost costless, in the same way that barcodes are today. reaswaran This article is copyright 2007 UsingRFID.com.

Big players grow the market

Some of the biggest names in the business now offer both chip and Chipless RFID in order to cover a full range of user needs. From AstraZeneca to Calvin Klein, companies are already using them in large volumes and many paper and packaging companies have licensed the various processes.

Chipless RFID tags can operate to over 10 meters in range and with 256 bits of data, and can cost as little as one-tenth of their silicon chip equivalents. Chipless RFID can be materials-based, or can consist of transistorless circuits. Transparent polymer transistor circuits are now also available from Philips, PolyIC, OrganicID and Motorola among others. These directly mimic the circuit on a chip.

The chipless future

These factors, the report says, mean that chipless technology is addressing mainstream RFID applications and is likely to grow the market rapidly through massive price reductions.

The report on chipless RFID contains detailed market forecasts from 2006 to 2016, an analysis of the technologies being implemented today, and several detailed case histories and company profiles of the various trials and successes in the industry. The authors also offer their assessment of who will be the winners and losers in the market, and what the future will bring.

Source: Using RFID.com

RFID Survey Reports Lack of Man Power

2007-05-31T16:29:00.000+05:30

The talent pool of RFID professionals is shallow and could impact the successful adoption of the technology by companies keen to comply with the expectations of major retailers, a recent industry report shows, writes Simon Pitman.

Eighty per cent of companies participating in the survey said they do not believe there are sufficient numbers of professionals skilled in RFID to hire from today - the report from the Comupting Technology Industry Association (CompTIA) finds. Two-thirds of organisations (66.7 per cent) said training and educating their employees in the technology is one of the biggest challenges they will face in order to succeed in the RFID market.

"We believe the market needs hundreds of systems integration companies with RFID capabilities; and hundreds of thousands of individuals knowledgeable in this technology to meet current and future demand," said David Sommer, vice president, electronic commerce, CompTIA.

Sommer presented the findings of the CompTIA survey in a presentation today at the RFID World 2005 conference in Dallas, Texas.

CompTIA says it is working with a cross section of major players in the RFID market to address the skills shortage. Product manufacturers, distributors, system integrators, education and training providers, and end-user customers are active in an effort to craft a vendor-neutral professional certification of RFID skills for individuals working with the technology.

The survey of CompTIA members found that customer adoption of RFID solutions is relatively modest. A significant number of companies - 71.4 per cent - said their customers have not implemented RFID solutions. For those organisations with customers that implemented RFID solutions, responding companies said that fewer than 20 per cent of their customers have done so.

Similarly, 80 per cent of the responding companies said either they have yet to go past the investigation stage of RFID implementation; or have done no investigation at all. Just 16 per cent have implemented one or more RFID pilot projects for themselves or their customers.

Survey respondents said their customers come from a variety of industries, including services, government, manufacturing, retail, health care, communications, and financial services and real estate.

When asked if they see their company offering RFID products and services in the next three years, 37.3 per cent of organisations said they definitely will; and 39.2 per cent said they would consider it if there is interest from their customers. Companies expect to offer hardware installation and maintenance services (82.1 per cent), software implementations (61.5 per cent) and other services (51.3 per cent).

The majority of respondents to the survey were value-added resellers and solutions providers (33.3 per cent); consultants and systems integrators (21.6 per cent); and manufactures (19.6 per cent). Two-thirds of the companies have annual revenues of up to $25 million; while 22 per cent are companies with annual revenues of $100 million or more.

So far companies in the US have been quickest to take up on the technology. In the manufacturing sector a lot of this movement is being driven by companies trying to comply with RFID requirements implemented by major retailers such as Wal-Mart.

This action has prompted many major players in industries such as the food and beverage industry, as well as the cosmetics and personal care industry to introduce the technology as a key part of their supply chain. Following on from this movement in the US, these companies are also starting to implement RFID systems to their operations in Europe, but at a slower pace.

Source: The Navigtor

In-Stat: Wi-Fi RFID tag market to double annually

2007-05-30T10:20:00.000+05:30

Market research firm In-Stat reported there were 135,000 shipments of Wi-Fi RFID tags in 2006 and the market is set to double each year until 2010. This would result to more than 2.1 million units in three years.

According to In-Stat, shipments under the AeroScout brand accounted for the majority of Wi-Fi RFID tags shipped in 2006 and the key application areas for growth are health care, heavy manufacturing, transportation and logistics.

"Historically, one of the key weaknesses of this market has been the short battery life of asset tags," said In-Stat analyst Daryl Schoolar in a statement. "G2 MicroSystems, the only tag-specific chip vendor, has made strides in overcoming this weakness, with multiyear battery life now a reality."

Source: EE-Times

RF switch enables seamless enterprise mobility

2007-05-29T12:47:00.000+05:30

In order to become 802.11n compliant, Motorola Inc. has introduced what it claims the industry's first RF wireless switch that bridges the gap between Wi-Fi and RFID, future RF technologies and indoor and outdoor wireless networks. The enterprise-class RF switch supports location, management and security services. The RFS7000 can accommodate Motorola and third-party vendor services, providing seamless enterprise mobility indoors to large businesses requiring a WLAN.

It is capable of supporting 256 802.11a/b/g access points and enables a new switch clustering concept, providing redundancy and high-performance scalability for up to 3,000 access points, Motorola said.

The RFS7000 is part of Motorola's end-to-end enterprise WLAN product suite, which comes under the company's MOTOwi4 portfolio of wireless broadband solutions and services that complement IP networks.

The RF switch's "locationing" capability enables real-time tracking of Wi-Fi devices and active tags. With this service, businesses have the ability to locate employees for safety or track high-value and mission-critical assets. In a healthcare setting, locationing services could be used to track crash carts, transfusion pumps, defibrillators, and portable X-ray and dialysis machines. Locationing can also be used to find and track inventory for customers.

Motorola's integrated management suite, comprised of a LAN planner and mobility services platform, is a set of tools to help enterprises centrally plan, deploy, manage and secure their RF infrastructure and environment, said the company. The integrated wireless intrusion protection system solution detects and locates rogue devices, protecting the network against denial-of-service attacks. The sensor-based system also provides compliance reporting and advanced forensics, as well as monitors, detects, protects and prevents intrusions to a wireless network.

Source: EE-Times

Epson invests in RuBee asset-tracking RFID tech

2007-05-16T18:00:00.000+05:30

Epson Electronics has entered a "strategic" investment with Visible Assets Inc., an asset tracker specialist and one of the main backers of wireless RuBee technology.

RuBee technology is a low-frequency network protocol for tough to track goods. They work underwater and in underground environments that obstruct higher-frequency RFID signals. RuBee tags can be made as thin as 1.5mm and operate for as long as 10 years using a coin-sized lithium ion battery.

Last year, the IEEE started work on developing a standard—dubbed 1902.1—for the protocol, whose backers in the retail sector include U.K.-based Tesco and Germany's Metro Group, as well as technology companies such as Hewlett-Packard, Intel, IBM, Sony, Panasonic and Motorola.

Visible Assets is using its patented technology to offer supply chain and asset visibility platforms to retailers.

"This investment will provide both companies with new commercial opportunities in many markets," Epson Electronics America (EEA) CEO Toshio Akahane said. "EEA and our parent company, Seiko Epson Corp. in Japan, plan to offer RuBee-enabled silicon devices, as well as using the technology in a wide variety of products."

The RuBee protocol works with both active radio tags and passive tags that have no battery. A controlled reading range of 1-100ft and an integrated clock ensure high security and privacy.

Source: EE-Times

RFID meets robotics: a twist in mobile supply tracking

2007-05-15T18:46:00.000+05:30

New hospital system uses robots to track and transport medical equipment

February 26, 2007 -- Aethon Inc. today announced a system that uses robots to monitor the movement of medical equipment tagged with radio frequency identification (RFID) chips and fetch it when needed by nurses or other hospital staff.

The new mobile asset utilization system is designed to locate, deliver and recover hospital equipment using RFID tags and two robots, the company said. The system includes a robot called Homer that constantly roams the hospital pinging for RFID tags on hospital equipment to track locations. A second robot, called Tug, delivers clean equipment and returns used equipment to a central location.

The Tug robot is already used at 75 hospitals as a courier to deliver and recover equipment, according to Pittsburgh-based Aethon.

The system is designed to keep track of large numbers of hospital equipment such as IV pumps, wheelchairs and respirators and to ensure staff can access them when they are needed, said Aldo Zini, Aethon's president and CEO.

"A lot of hospitals are beginning to realize that to get the true value out of an asset-tracking system so they can actually improve asset utilization and decrease costs you have to do more than locate assets," he said. "You need to be able to locate it, retrieve it and deliver it to its proper location."

Zini said that many asset-tracking systems used in hospitals today require the installation of an expensive infrastructure of antennas and receivers to triangulate the location of RFID-tagged equipment.

Aethon's system uses the robot's single antenna to track the location of tagged equipment and does not require that more equipment be installed, he noted. In addition, the Homer robot can read multiple third-party RFID tags, Zini said.

The company said it does not require hospitals to sign site licenses but instead offers per-tag pricing.

Skill Shortage Hits RFID Growth

2007-05-14T09:51:00.000+05:30

Radio frequency identification is significantly hampered by the shortage of IT professionals who are trained in the technology

The IT industry is facing a shortage of professionals well-versed in RFID (radio frequency identification) technology, and this could affect the adoption of the technology, warned a senior official at Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA).

According to Michael Mudd, the industry body's Asia-Pacific director of public policy, there are fewer than 1,000 qualified IT professionals available worldwide who understand and know enough to deploy and service RFID technology. Mudd was in town for the RFID Connect Asia held here last week.

For instance, Mudd said, compared with the "hundreds of thousands" of technicians who are certified by CompTIA or other IT vendors such as Cisco Systems, and skilled in fixing PCs or servers, the current number of available RFID skilled workers is "very low".

In an interview with ZDNet Asia, he noted: "It's probably one of the things that's keeping back the deployment of the [RFID] technology."

Companies do not simply consider the cost of buying the technology when they look at deploying RFID, he added. "It's [also about] the cost of maintaining, training, servicing [and] replacement of spare parts," Mudd said.

"The RFID skills shortage must be addressed to help drive down implementation costs and make a better ROI (returns on investment) case", he said.

Mudd cautioned that the skills dearth can prove to be the next biggest inhibitor of successful RFID deployment after customers cross the implementation hurdle.

According to preliminary results of a CompTIA survey conducted in February this year, which polled 56 members from the industry group, 69.6 percent of the respondents indicated that there is an insufficient RFID talent pool. Some 64.7 percent also believed that the lack of skilled individuals will affect the adoption of RFID.

Mudd said: "RFID is not yet a plug-and-play technology. Each deployment is unique, and within each deployment, any number of variables can affect its success or failure."

"Most of the [RFID] skills that are lacking are in the areas of understanding how the physics of radio frequencies work, and how to tag items so that they are readable," he said.

He noted that to execute any RFID initiative successfully, there needs to be trained and certified professionals with knowledge and experience in radio frequency engineering and design, supply chain management, logistics, warehouse management, and familiarity in RFID products and standards.

According to CompTIA, the industry body has worked with over 20 organizations with "leadership positions in RFID technology" to develop an industry-accepted credential that validates a technician's knowledge and skills in the areas of installation, maintenance, repair and upkeep of hardware and software functionality of RFID products. For instance, the CompTIA RFID+ is a vendor-neutral certification that addresses critical skills related to the installation, maintenance, repair and troubleshooting of hardware and software functionality of RFID products.

RFID Passive Tags Track Cars

2007-05-05T09:25:00.000+05:30

A South African company, iPico Holdings, "has developed and tested RFID passive tags and readers that can be used to monitor vehicles at a read distance of 17 feet traveling at speeds of 160 mph.

The tags are attached to the windshield inside the cars while the readers are placed on the roadside or on bridges. When an equipped car passes in front a reader, at a speed not exceeding 250 kph, the unique 64-bit ID of the tag is read. The readers, which cost about US$1,000, can detect up to 7,200 vehicles per minute. The tags cost currently 60 cents each -- for an order of 5 million tags. The technology will be used to control traffic and speed, but also will enable immediate traffic ticketing or toll collection.

Here is the Funda

South African RFID chip and reader design firm iPico Holdings announced the commercial availability of its Electronic Number Plate (ENP) RFID technology. The company says its technology is already being deployed in a pilot in South America.

IPico’s new UHF ENP technology uses the company’s existing EM4222 passive chip design already used for supply chain management and tire-tagging applications. For its ENP system, however, the company redesigned the tag so it could be attached to the inside of a vehicle’s windshield and developed readers for roadside placement.

Using RFID in electronic vehicle identification promises to support a range of applications both for government and local authorities and for businesses. The technology is being considered for electronic vehicle licensing, traffic, speed and cross-border control and traffic ticketing, as well as for existing operations such as road toll collection and fleet and parking management.

Will this technology really work?

The company maintains that when used with its readers, the ENP tag can be read at distances that allow readers to be placed at the roadside or on bridges over roads. In July, the company demonstrated the technology at an automotive test track operated by Gerotek Test Facilities in Pretoria. Four Smart cars, a DaimlerChrysler line of very small vehicles sold in South Africa as well as in Europe and Asia, were each fitted with two ENP tags to simulate eight vehicles.

The system was tested as the cars drove closely together at both at low speed (80 kph, or 50 mph) and high speed (120 kph, or 75 mph), says iPico, and all the tags were read each time they passed roadside readers. In addition, an ENP tag placed on the inside windshield of a Mercedes Benz C55 model was also succesfully read while the car traveled at speeds in excess of 250 kph (160 mph).

OK, it works for one car, but does it also work to control thousands of cars?
according to the company, its system can read up to 200 tags per second; on a continuous basis, the system can read an average of 7,200 tags per minute. These volumes can be read either by a single reader, by a single reader that has an array of up to four antennas, or by multiple readers in close proximity (say four readers covering four lanes of a highway) that are connected with iPico’s DIMI (Device Information & Management Interface) middleware platform.

IPico has started a test program in a non-disclosed country in South America, and says that 5 million tags have already been ordered. In the future, the tags will also contain more information, such as the vehicle license plate, which will permit to detect stolen cars.

Source : www.primidi.com

Rugged RFID antenna suits baler, compactor applications

2007-05-04T08:36:00.000+05:30

Tyco Electronics has expanded its RFID solutions product family with the introduction of a line of ruggedized RFID antennas for use in baler and compactor RFID applications.

The M/A-COM MAAN-000210-AT0000 is a linear polarized antenna with a high-density polyethylene radome that is said to provide superior protection from constant abrasion. It also has a neoprene gasket to prevent liquids from infiltrating the antenna.

The M/A-COM MAAN-000210-AT0000 antennas operate with a typical gain of 2.5dB. The antennas have a beam width of 130° at 3dB, and a typical Voltage Standing Wave Radio (VSWR) of 1.5:1. Multidirectional conduit access holes and a removable connector access panel are available for more efficient installation. The connector housing is removable for use in National Electrical Manufacturer's Association (NEMA) enclosures.

The M/A-COM MAAN-000210-AT0000 is a customized antenna. Price and delivery quotes can be obtained directly from Tyco Electronics' M/A-COM sales channels.

Source : EE-Times

Motorola, Avery team to deliver RFID solution

2007-05-03T08:44:00.000+05:30

Motorola Inc. and Avery Dennison Corp. announced a strategic relationship under which Avery Dennison RFID will supply EPCglobal Gen 2 RFID tags to Motorola, increasing the speed of RFID deployments and product availability to large markets.

The agreement aligns Avery Dennison's cost effective inlay manufacturing capabilities with Motorola's hardware and tag design expertise. Motorola will now be able to more quickly fulfill the growing demand for its portfolio of custom RFID tags, including its high-performance airline baggage tag and durable tags for asset tracking. In addition, by working together on RFID solutions, both companies will be able to optimize RFID systems for real world deployments.

"Together, Motorola and Avery Dennison can build on successful customer engagements with an even stronger reader-and-tag solution," said Joe White, vice president of RFID marketing and business development for the enterprise mobility business, Motorola Networks & Enterprise. "Motorola's broad portfolio of intellectual property in EPC RFID tags and readers, combined with Avery Dennison's expertise in high-volume inlay manufacturing, will provide Motorola customers with a reliable supply of quality, high-performance RFID tag products."

"By working together, Avery Dennison and Motorola will enable customers to better manage their assets and enhance their return on investment in RFID," said Bob Cornick, vice president and general manager of Avery Dennison RFID.

Motorola plans to start shipping Avery Dennison-supplied Gen 2 tags in 2H 2007.

Source : EE-Times

NIST issues RFID security guidelines

2007-05-02T12:25:00.000+05:30

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has issued guidelines for RFID. NIST's report on RFID security was released last week as it urges everyone using the technology to evaluate security and privacy risks and use best practices to mitigate them. The institute said it released the report to meet some of its responsibilities under the Federal Information and Security Management Act of 2002, which requires federal agencies to secure information technology systems.

NIST also said the report is likely to benefit other types of organizations as well.

"The goal of our report is to give organizations practical ways in a structured format with checklists and specific recommendations to address potential RFID security risks," said NIST's Tom Karygiannis in a statement.

The document focuses on asset management, tracking, matching and supply chain uses. It recommends the use of firewalls to separate RFID databases from other IT systems and databases. NIST also urges users to encrypt radio signals, authenticate approved users, and block tag signals with metal shields to prevent unauthorized skimming of information. The report states that auditing, logging, and time-stamping should be used to detect security breaches and it urges users to establish tag disposal and recycling procedures for disabling the devices and destroying data.

"RFID tags, commonly referred to as smart tags, have the ability to improve logistics, profoundly change cost structures for business, and improve the current levels of safety and authenticity of the international pharmaceutical supply chain and many other industries," Undersecretary of Commerce for Technology Robert C. Cresanti said in a prepared statement. "This important report lays the foundation for addressing potential RFID security risks so that a thoughtful enterprise can launch a smart tag program with confidence."

The 115-page report covers several aspects of RFID technology, including applications, requirements, middleware, networks, economics, environment and durability.

Source : EE-Times

ISO acknowledges South Korea's mobile RFID technology

2007-04-30T15:55:00.001+05:30

The South Korean Commerce, Industry and Energy Ministry reports that the country's proprietary mobile RFID technology, known as Object Identifier (OID), has been adopted as an international standard by the Geneva-based International Organization for Standardization.

A ministry spokesman said the mobile RFID technology, developed by the state-run Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute, allows mobile phones to read a wide range of RFID tags. Through OID-equipped handsets, users can read detailed product data on RFID tags.

With the ISO-standardized RFID technology, South Korea will be able to protect its domestic mobile RFID market, which is expected to reach $752 million in 2010, said the ministry spokesman.

The country's mobile telecommunications service carriers, including SK Telecom and KTF, are now testing the relevant services with various industries, according to the ministry.

Source : EE-Times

ISO acknowledges South Korea's mobile RFID technology

2007-04-30T15:55:00.000+05:30

EPCIS ratification boosts RFID industry

2007-04-19T12:05:00.000+05:30

Giving a boost to the RFID industry, EPCIS (Electronic Product Code Information Services) ratification provided businesses a standard way to capture and share information collected by RFID chips. This is done by giving a standard set of interfaces for EPC data.

EPCIS provides a standard set of interfaces for EPC data. Chris Adcock, president of the standards organisation EPCglobal Inc., called the ratification as potentially having more impact than the 2004 release of the UHF Gen2 Passive RFID standard. Those are big words, since the Gen2 standard led to the development of considerably cheaper and better performing Gen2 RFID chips.

Five years after proponents began insisting that RFID would dramatically change the way companies track goods in the supply chain, RFID remains a niche technology partly held back by the complexities associated with exchanging information captured by RFID and turning it into knowledge that leads to such basic business goals as lower costs or higher revenues.

Vendors involved in the interoperability testing of EPCIS—and those likely to offer products that support the standard—include Auto-ID Labs, Avicon, BEA Systems, Bent Systems, IBM, Globe Ranger, IIJ, NEC, Oracle, Polaris Systems, Samsung and T3Ci.

Still, while EPCglobal and RFID vendors are working to create standards-based RFID technologies and processes, other challenges remain. RFID tags are still too costly in many instances, and RFID pioneers continue to struggle with what to do with all of the data they're collecting from the tags, and how to turn it into real business intelligence.

Source : EE Times-India

Cattle give RFIDs field trials

2007-03-22T12:52:00.000+05:30

The EM4569 RFID from EM Microelectronic is currently in field trials in North America. The RFID has been adopted by several tag manufacturers and used as a safe and efficient alternative to other forms of branding or marking cattle.

For cattle in England, one identification tag is required, allowing each cow to be tracked throughout its life. Many farms also use a second tag to identify age and medical history. While identification tags are not required by law in the United States, they are a very important management tool.
In addition to its consumer-friendly price, the EM4569 has unmatched performance in terms of detection range. “In a recent field trial using long-range animal readers, the EM4569 embedded in an ear-tag format was read at a distance of up to one metre, considerably more than other conventional RFID tags,” explains Mougahed Darwish, president of the management board of EM Microelectronic. “Additionally, the EM4569 is compliant with ISO 11784/5 and has bi-phase RF/32, making it very functional in the animal world.”

The EM4569 is a passive RFID circuit with long reading range, specifically for use in animal identification. Its features include bumped enlarged pads for direct antenna connection to save space and mounting costs.

Intended for use in electronic read/write RF transponders, the new circuit is a 125 kHz, 512-bit contactless identification CMOS RFID IC. Several data rate and data encoding options are available at a decreased level of power consumption. The RFID IC also increases reading distance, making it suitable for animal identification (ISO 11784/5).

The EM4569 is the enlarged-pad version of the EM4469, says EM Microelectronic; the enlarged pads allow direct antenna connection via bumps deposited on the enlarged pads, so the customer can directly solder the wire of the antenna onto it without the need for pcb support. Such pads also decrease the cost since the IC requires fewer handling operations.

Source : EM Micro Electronics

European Commission proposes RFID strategy

2007-03-20T08:44:00.000+05:30

Exactly a year after launching an extensive Europe-wide public consultation on RFID tags, the European Commission unveiled proposals for an RFID strategy to address the privacy concerns of citizens.

"From fighting counterfeits to better healthcare, smart RFID-chips offers tremendous opportunities for business and society," said information society and media commissioner Viviane Reding when presenting the Commission's strategy at the CeBIT fair. "Last year I said here at CeBIT that we should stimulate the use of RFID technology in Europe whilst safeguarding personal data and privacy. The Commission's Europe-wide public consultation in 2006 identified a strong lack of awareness and considerable concern among citizens. The Commission's RFID strategy will therefore seek to raise awareness, stress the absolute need for citizens to decide how their personal data is used and ensure that Europe removes existing obstacles to RFID's enormous potential."

The economic potential of smart radio tags can hardly be underestimated. In 2006 alone, over 1 billion RFID tags were sold worldwide, and by 2016 it might be over 500 times this number. The European market is estimated to grow from $665 million in 2006 to $9.3 billion by 2016. Europe is also a leading international player for RFID R&D, and its industry is strongly placed, the Commission said.

However, awareness about the potential of RFID is low. According to the Commission, about 60 percent of the 2,190 respondents to the public consultation in 2006 said they did not know enough to adequately assess the pros and cons of RFID technology. Of those who are aware, 70 percent believed that technical solutions were the best way to reduce security, data protection and privacy concerns, 67 percent expressed their support for awareness-raising campaigns to educate consumers, and 55 percent called for RFID regulations.

To enhance Europe's ability to reap the economic and social benefits of RFID technology while answering consumer concerns, the Commission published last week the RFID Communication, enumerating the steps to be taken for by the Commission for its new RFID policy.

According to the RFID Communication, the Commission will create an RFID Stakeholder Group to provide advice and assistance to the Commission in developing a European policy position concerning RFID applications and propose amendments to the e-Privacy Directive to take account of RFID applications.

By the end of 2007, the Commission will publish a recommendation on how to handle date security and privacy of smart radio tags to Member States and stakeholders. In association with the Stakeholder Group, the Commission will then analyze the economic and social effects of smart radio tags and other technologies, particularly focusing on privacy, trust and governance, leading to an assessment of policy options and need for further legislative steps, by the end of 2008.

The RFID Communication also highlighted where the Commission wants to ensure that further development and deployment of smart radio tags are as safe, secure, privacy-friendly and effective as possible. This includes looking at research and innovation, the availability of radio spectrum, standardization, environmental and health issues, and also ensuring that digital identities are well protected against abuse.

Source : EE Times

Malaysia develops 'smallest' RFID chip

2007-03-13T09:00:00.000+05:30

After two years of R&D, the Malaysia Microchip Project gains success with the release of the world's 'smallest' RFID microchip. The latest version of the Malaysia Microchip measures only 0.7mm-by-0.7mm.

In 2003, the Malaysian government bought the technology and the rights to design, manufacture and market the chip from Japan's FEC Inc. Following that, three versions of the chip have been developed.

The microchip emits radio waves on multiple frequencies, enabling detection even when embedded in paper documents such as money, or in objects or animals.

The first commercial application of the technology in Malaysia is for tagging and identifying original versions of movies on DVDs to curb the rampant video piracy in the country. The Malaysia government will also use the chip to prevent forgeries of documents such as passports and birth certificates.

In April or May, the technology will be used for a pilot project at Malaysia's and Hong Kong's international airports. The chip will be used in tagging luggage travelling between the two airports. This will help easily locate luggage lost or removed from airplanes as well as boost security services in the airports.

The development of the chip cost around $50-60 million. It costs 6 cents each. At present, the chip is manufactured in Japan but there are plans to move the production to Malaysia.

Officials said that they will market the chip internationally. At present, "inquiries are coming in" from countries about the chip, they added.

Source : EE Times Asia

Japanese consortium builds RFID logistics network

2007-02-02T18:13:00.000+05:30

Internet Initiative Japan (IIJ), an internet access and network solutions provider, has partnered with NTT Comware, Oracle Japan, and VeriSign Japan to construct an RFID system based on a jointly developed standard for use in the international logistics pilot programme that is being conducted by EPCglobal, the international RFID standards group.

International logistics is the backbone of global supply chains and logistics service providers handle huge information with a multitude of customers located throughout the world. The result has been a complex system whose costs grow annually. reaswaran This article is copyright 2007 UsingRFID.com.

Supply chain demand

The demand for advanced systems and supply-chain visibility in the logistics industry is growing, as is the demand for an international standard to facilitate the use, expansion, and spread of RFID. To this end, several logistic service providers and EPCglobal established the Transportation & Logistics Services Industry Action Group in November 2005.

This year the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry offered its support, and the international logistics RFID pilot programme was initiated, with the first phase involving a test from Hong Kong to Japan possibly coming in February 2007, and the second phase involving a test from Shanghai to Los Angeles, possibly in October 2007.

First phase participants

Potential participants in the first phase include international logistics service providers, DHL, Maersk, NYK, Schenker, and Schneider. The first phase test is scheduled to include interoperability over the RFID system. This pilot is intended to test the suitability of the RFID specification to the demands of businesses in the field, and to bring any operational problems to light so that they can be resolved.

Participating Companies It is vital for this pilot that the integration of an RFID system makes global supply chains visible. Through this pilot, NTT Comware, IIJ, Oracle Japan, and VeriSign Japan form the Japan Application Consortium (JAC).This consortium integrates an RFID system that can access and exchange information from RFID tags attached to products and containers, and each company contribute their EPCglobal-compliant products and solutions to the project.

These RFID systems in each country and company will work together to create an open platform for the exchange of supply chain information, and help make the supply chain visible, efficient, and effective for logistics service providers, shippers, and others in the industry. This, it is hoped, will contribute to business as a whole.

Through the pilot, the companies intend to show the effectiveness and results that are achievable by using an open platform for the exchange of RFID information.

Pilot's significance

The results of this pilot programme will be used to actively promote an international standard, and provide practical experience in applying RFID technology to the logistics industry.

Connecting different systems, effortlessly handling large volumes of data, ensuring greater security - these and other features will characterize the RFID system as it matures, and leveraging the achievements, experience, and technological strengths of the participating companies, the objective is a worldwide open platform.

Source : Using RFID

Smartcode invests in India RFID centre

2007-01-24T09:12:00.000+05:30

SmartCode Corp., a supplier of RFID hardware solutions, has announced the establishment of a RFID Centre in India, and the addition of 18 new partnerships in India. The company has made an investment of up to Rs.67.98 crore ($15 million).

The new RFID Centre will further expand SmartCode Corp's footprint in the India market and will include Research & Development, Sales & Marketing, and Distribution for the India market. The new RFID Centre in India will also cater to the neighbouring markets of Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal and Burma. SmartCode Corp's RFID Centre will join SmartCode's long established presence in the Asian market including China, Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia.

"SmartCode Corp.'s 18 new partnerships in India further demonstrate our dominance in the Global RFID market and the strong demand we see for our low cost, high performance RFID solutions worldwide" said Avi Ofer, CEO & President, SmartCode Corp., "With the establishment of SmartCode's new RFID Centre in India, we are expanding our global presence to more than 100 countries worldwide."

The Indian market presents lucrative and diverse opportunities for products, services, and commitment. India's infrastructure, transportation, energy, environmental, health care, high-tech, and defence sector requirements for equipment and services will exceed tens of billions of dollars in the mid-term as the Indian economy globalises and expands. India's GDP, currently growing at around seven per cent, makes it one of the fastest growing economies in the world. Construction of nearly everything from airports to container ports to teleports is setting the stage to remake India.

Source : EE Times India

TI unveils high-frequency RFID reader IC family

2007-01-19T09:16:00.000+05:30

Using advanced design practices to increase reader efficiency while reducing the IC footprint, Texas Instruments Inc. (TI) has announced the availability of a high-frequency (13.56MHz), multi-standard RFID reader IC product family. The advanced package design of the TRF7960 family measures 5-by-5mm, and supports ISO/IEC 14443A/B, ISO/IEC 15693, ISO/IEC 18000-3 and TI's contactless commerce and Tag-It portfolio.

To maximise read range and reliability, said TI, the integrated on-board linear voltage regulators that turn up the analogue, digital and power amplifiers, provide power supply noise isolation. The reader has an integrated analogue front end and data framing system for all the supported standards, while the dual receiver input configuration of the TRF7960 reader family detects AM and PM. This feature helps to eliminate read 'holes' created when antenna orientation in the operating environment changes the tag return signal from AM to PM resulting in more consistent tag reads.

By providing an internal clock for the microcontroller, the TRF7960 powered reader uses only a single 13.56MHz crystal rather than the standard two crystals, reducing the total bill of materials of the end reader product. Designed with fewer components, TI's reader IC consumes less power, takes up less space, and can therefore address sensitivity and noise attenuation issues. Other integrated functions include error checking, data formatting, framing and anti-collision support for multi-reader environments. The TRF7960 is designed for both fixed and handheld reader devices.

Power consumption for the overall reader is reduced by providing seven flexible manual or automated configuration settings which shut down unused sections of the reader to save power. The TRF7960 IC operates between 2.7Vdc to 5.5Vdc input supply voltage and when in power down mode, consumption is less than 1µA while standby current is less than 120µA.

The TRF7961 supports ISO/IEC 15693, and ISO/IEC 18000-3 standards and TI's Tag-It portfolio. The TRF7960 supports the standards listed above plus the ISO/IEC 14443A/B standard and TI's contact less commerce portfolio. With a high level of integration, lower power consumption and a smaller footprint, both devices are available today from TI and its authorised distributors in the standard 32-pin QFN (IC to board) connection packages. A reference design and source code for an evaluation module, with TI's MSP430 ultra-low-power microcontroller, is available for easy evaluation of the TRF7960 family .

RFID - Year 2006 Performance

2007-01-08T22:24:00.001+05:30

Despite some areas under performing, most of the RFID business is booming. Here IDTechEx has interviewed key companies in different vertical sectors and have presented their comments on the opportunity for RFID in those sectors.

Most of the RFID business is booming. Andrew Price RFID Manager at IATA, the airline trade association, enthuses, "In the next few years the air industry will be tagging an ever higher proportion of its two billion bags yearly and it will use RFID in other new applications as well." This is a global phenomenon, not least in government applications. Dr Jimmy Li, Deputy Director of the Initiative Office for Government RFID Applications at the Ministry of Economic Affairs Taiwan and Senior Advisor of the Institute for Information Industry in Taiwan says, "Government applications of RFID are now growing rapidly. We started five RFID projects in the government area this year and there are more to come next year."

Steve Georgevitch, Total Asset Visibility Program Manager of Boeing Integrated Defense Systems says, "The aerospace and defense industries are on a rapid RFID adoption path with substantial benefits anticipated in the next several years".

Martin Capper, President, Mark IV IVHS Division says, "Mark IV sees RFID as an explosive market particularly in the Transportation segment with the evolution from the existing electronic payment systems to new applications delivering safety and mobility for both individuals and commercial traffic. The emergence of DSRC at 5.9GHz will create the next paradigm shift in surface transportation."

There are also new markets opening up beyond transport. Dr Chang-Hun Lee of the National Information Society Agency, Korea says, "Ubiquitous Sensor Networks will be a huge RFID market in a few years."

RFID tagging of livestock is driven by ever wider legislation. For example, the European Community and New Zealand join the party in 2008-2010, creating a market for tagging sheep, goats, pigs and cows, the total demand for these two regions being over 150 million tags yearly at about $2 each in 2010 from almost none today. Add a big demand for systems to that figure. The largest bookseller in the Netherlands BGN is ordering several million tags yearly for its new scheme and its payback is so compelling that others will rapidly follow.

When it comes to the biggest RFID market - contactless smart cards - Don Davis, Editor of Card Technology says, "Big players are making major bets on contactless, and forcing competitors to catch up. They are issuing large numbers of contactless cards and fobs and, in Japan, adding contactless functionality to millions of mobile phones, giving many consumers the chance to pay with a wave."

Contactless cards are a huge success and contactless ticket sales are also taking off exponentially. The China National ID card and system is the biggest rollout but an even larger budget of at least $15 billion is planned for the UK National ID card. Then there is continued growth in secure access applications and the start of the process of converting over three billion financial cards from Visa, MasterCard, American Express and JCB to RFID. Eurosmart sees sales of these RFID financial cards doubling to 20 million in 2007. In the US alone, 150,000 readers have just been installed for these financial cards but that is only the beginning. RFID cards and tickets and RFID enabled mobile phones (Near Field Communication) increasingly provide payments, ticketing, and secure access. All three devices are seeing rapid growth.

The China National ID scheme will peak at a huge 300 million US $2.45 cards delivered in 2007. Card readers valued at $1.2 billion are being ordered to go with them. The global market for RFID cards and systems will pass $3 billion in 2008. The figure below shows the market for RFID cards, which is fully analysed, together with tickets and RFID phones, in the new IDTechEx report Contactless Smart Cards and Near Field Communication 2007-2017.

Value of global market for RFID cards 2007-2010 in millions of US dollars excluding the China ID card

Source: IDTechEx report Contactless Smart Cards and Near Field Communication 2007-2017

IDTechEx forecasts that sales of RFID tickets will rocket from 100 million in 2007 to 450 million in 2010. Others are even more bullish in their forecasts. Certainly, the national railway system in China uses three billion tickets yearly, so its recent order for hundreds of millions of RFID tickets is only a beginning.

All the experts quoted in this article will present at the sixth annual RFID Smart Labels USA and Active RFID & RTLS conference in Boston, February 21-22 2007 www.smartlabelsusa.com. This major conference will be attended by many companies that intend to place large orders for RFID.

Source:

Raghu Das, Idtechex

German Meat-Tracking Project Focuses on Lasers and RFID

2007-01-08T15:55:00.000+05:30

A group of university researchers are developing a system designed to ensure the freshness of meat distributed throughout the supply chain.

Jan. 2, 2007—A few months ago, Germans were horrified when government authorities announced they had uncovered 110 tons of rotten meat at several wholesale warehouses in Bavaria. Some of this meat was more than four years out of date, and may have been exported to other European Union countries. The manager for one of the involved wholesalers hung himself as the scandal received widened coverage.

However, an RFID project funded by the federal government in Germany may help eliminate future abuses of this kind. Not long before the news erupted, five research institutes launched a project to develop an RFID-based system using laser beams to recognize and record meat freshness

The FreshScan project, funded with €3 million from the Federal Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF), is being coordinated by the Fraunhofer Institute for Reliability and Micro-integration (IZM) in Berlin, which focuses on assembly and packaging technologies. No commercial partners are participating at the current time.

Established in mid-2006, the three-year project FreshScan project is still in the conceptual phase. The participants are developing a two-component system. The first part consists of a semi-active RFID tag with temperature sensors to document the condition of meat, from slaughter to sale, and record temperatures on a continual basis. The second is an RFID reader integrated with an optical detector—a device utilizing a laser to analyze and record the meat's condition in the tag. "The reader measures the light spectrum in which chemical changes can be detected," says Rolf Thomasius, an IZM researcher involved in the project.

Other partners consist of the Ferdinand-Braun-Institut für Hoechstfrequenztechnik (FBH), which is developing the optical detector; the Federal Research Center for Nutrition and Food (BfEL), which is defining those chemicals and positions in the radio spectrum that should be monitored by the system; the Leibniz Institute for Agricultural Engineering Potsdam-Bornim (ATB), which is determining how best to read the signals and define the freshness parameters; and the Technical University of Berlin (TU), which is designing the software needed to run the device. In addition, two professors are studying the chemical makeup of meat samples as they age. Fraunhofer's IZM is coordinating the results of the research conducted by these partners, and is building a demonstration model.

To determine the meat's freshness, the system will use technology often found in telescopes or satellites. One potential technology researchers are testing is Raman spectroscopy. This involves pointing a laser beam at the meat and measuring the beam's absorption and reflection, which change as the meat's chemical properties (i.e., the freshness) change.

The processing site will tag the meat's packaging, and the sensor on the RFID tag will measure temperature, moisture and light incidence at different intervals, recording this information on the tag. This mobile "freshness scanner" will be used at different points to determine the meat's condition.

No vendors have yet been chosen for the project, and standards remain unclear at present. However, Thomasius says the tags used are likely to be 13.56 MHz and comply with an ISO standard. Additionally, the designers are working out the type of power on which the tags should rely. When the project is finished, the demonstration model will still need some more development before it can be brought to market.

"Our goal is to create a very close prototype at the end product, so that we can launch the system shortly after the research project ends," he says.

According to Thomasius, one focus of the project is to create a tag that is smaller and thinner than 2 millimeters and can last at least one year so it can be reused. Since the project is noncommercial at this point, researchers are not focusing on the cost of the components.

Source : RFID Journal

IBM's RFID tech to combat fake pharmaceuticals

2006-12-25T12:59:00.000+05:30

While we've long discussed both the benefits and nefarious uses of RFID but IBM's got a new purpose for wireless tags that could benefit pharmaceuticals. IBM announced that it will include RFID tags on drug packages as a way to track and verify the authenticity of a particular substance. Next thing you know our nanobot controlled interiors are going to be analyzing embedded RFID in order to decide whether harmful drug interactions will occur if fully digested and metabolized. Ah, the miracles of science.

Source:

Posted by Cyrus Farivar in Engadget

Your secrets not so safe with RFID-enabled passports

2006-12-16T20:06:00.000+05:30

Ever since these newfangled RFID e-passports hit the mainstream, understandable concerns have frequently surfaced regarding the security (or lack thereof) involved. The Dutch version has already been cracked, Germans can clone theirs, and Ireland's doesn't even have a protective sheath to keep its data safe from unauthorized readers; now it appears that you have one more reason to stick with the ole laminated paper version, as security researchers have released "proof-of-contact code that they say enables an attacker to read the passport number, date of birth, and passport expiration date." The flaw was unveiled by Adam Laurie -- a well-respected watchman of Bluetooth security weaknesses -- in his "Bugtraq" newsletter, but no specifics were reported regarding how evildoers could extract such precious information and subsequently steal your identity. Nevertheless, those RFID-shielding manufacturers must be licking their chops right about now, and rightfully so.

Source:
Posted by Darren Murph in Engadget

Here comes RFID Gaurdian -Is it the Nemisis of RFID ?

2006-12-15T10:18:00.001+05:30

Having covered different facets of RFID, I found logic in covering this news also. Anyway, this blog is supposed to show anything related to RFID.

Let's face. Researchers in Amsterdam have gone ahead and created a device which would prevent RFID tags from being read and this was being done with the aim of protecting users from this technology which was posing a threat to their privacy.

Called the RFID Guardian, it is a PDA size handheld device which warns a person that when a RFID scanner is trying to read a chip by beeping. This device runs on a 550MHz XScale 32 bit processor with 64Mbytes of RAM. The next few months would be spent by the research team on debugging and preparing the device for commercial use.

Though one can question its commerical viability as questioned by an industry observer who says that since RFID is touted to be next big thing in the pervasive computing, all materials in the future will come embedded with RF identification. RFID gaurdian would keep on warning, forcing the user to turn it off to stop the incessant beeping. Well, he goes to propose another model instead - A RFID Jammer.

This device, the size of a fountain pen, could act as a shield by emitting a constant RF jamming signal capable of preventing any RFID reader within a six foot radius from reading any of your RFID data. Now there is a device worth having.

Surely, the scientist from amsterdam is also listening. Expect some surprise too.

RFID companies still not ready for growth, says expert

2006-12-14T07:23:00.000+05:30

The RFID market is expected to grow at a compound annual growth rate of nearly 20 percent over the next six years and several factors are coming together to ease adoption of the technology. Still, many businesses aren't ready to deal with the growth, according to an expert with the Computing Technology Industry Association (CompTIA).

Frost & Sullivan recently reported that the total North American RFID market for manufacturing and logistics is predicted to grow at a compound annual growth rate of nearly 20 percent over the next six years. Yet, about 75 percent of the technology companies responding to a CompTIA survey earlier this year said there aren't enough people trained in the field. Eighty-percent said they believe that a lack of talent will hinder RFID adoption.

David Sommer, VP of e-business and software solutions at CompTIA, who speaks often about the looming shortage of RFID-trained workers, said that many factors are converging to promote RFID growth, but companies must focus on training workers to make sure the technology will work for them.

Global standards, interoperability, and declining prices are working in favor of rapid adoption, said Sommer, who worked with more than 20 organizations to develop CompTIA's professional RFID certification program. Sommer said he does not believe that there is a "magic number" for calculating when the cost of RFID technology will be low enough to trigger widespread adoption.

"We've seen where the tag itself, the semiconductor with the antenna, has gotten down to the 10- to 17-cent level," he said during a recent interview, adding that the prices vary depending on how companies deploy the technology. "The costs are continuing to decrease to the point where they are becoming very attractive."

In 2007, consumers will begin seeing more RFID tags on individual items. They will appear on higher-end electronics and pharmaceuticals before they make it into everyday products, he said.

"You're going to see them on expensive items, things that are easily counterfeited," he said. "It will be a ways down the road before you see it on the item level on something like toothpaste. It's a question of time and economics."

Eventually, when RFID is used in personal items such as clothing, retailers are likely to use technology that allows consumers to have the tags "killed" at checkout counters.

First, companies must train or hire people who have mastered the technology. "Few people understand how to tag goods to make sure they're readable and how to configure readers in order to make sure they work," Sommer said.

He urges training for technologists deploying solutions, for solution providers, and for users. CompTIA offers an international, vendor-neutral certification program to measure technologists' ability to install, maintain, repair, and troubleshoot for hardware and software functioning. It also offers links to certified training and test-taking resources.

Source:

K.C. Jones, InformationWeek

Item level RFID - the prosperous market 2006-2016

2006-12-14T06:58:00.000+05:30

Item level RFID is set for substantial growth over the next decade. A new study from IDTechEx forecasts and explores key markets that will apply item-level tagging, advances in technology and the mass adoption that will follow. Dr. Peter Harrop from IDTechEx summarises this study. See www.idtechex.com/item for more information.

Visit www.idtechex.com/item to learn more about IDTechEx research on Item Level RFID

Item level RFID is the tagging of the smallest taggable unit of things - the library book, apparel, jewellery, engineering parts and laundry are examples. Already profitable for most suppliers, item level tags and systems will be the world's largest RFID market by value from 2007 onwards. Item level RFID tagging will rocket from $0.16 billion in 2006 to $13 billion in 2016 for systems including tags. In 2006, 0.2 billion items will be RFID tagged in the world. In 2016, 550 billion items may be RFID tagged. Those adopting item level tagging today do so willingly and are prepared to pay for good performance as they enjoy rapid multiple paybacks.

Relatively problem free

This is in some contrast to pallet and case tagging where consumer goods companies are required by retailers to fit the tags regardless of economics. The consumer goods companies are therefore reluctant purchasers of RFID and these tag and interrogator prices are in free fall from oversupply. The RFID tag and interrogator suppliers involved typically lose money. Here we are talking about Far Field UHF tags, which work well enough on pallets, cases and air baggage under US radio regulations but are only relatively trouble free elsewhere in applications with very low reader density, shortish range and dry, non-metallic environments. That means retail apparel in the UK and Japan and books in bookshops in the Netherlands, for example. The problems elsewhere are because, as yet, few countries outside the US permit adequate UHF power levels, bandwidth and signalling protocols for RFID. By contrast, HF is the most popular frequency for item level tagging and, with well over one billion such tags delivered, it encounters few remaining technical problems. So called Near Field UHF is a promising alternative that may give lower costs when proven in high volume applications.

Unique requirements

The biggest item level potential involves uniquely coding very high volume products, such as consumer goods, postal items, apparel, books, drugs and manufactured parts. These total 5-10 trillion items a year. Item level tagging therefore involves most or all of the following features and this creates technical and business challenges and benefits that are very different from those in other applications of RFID.

Suitable for Electronic Product Code EPC coding/mass serialisation and open systems
Small
Made in millions to trillions yearly
Need to read items individually but also many at a time
Proximate metal and/or water
Potential paybacks rarely worth more than a few percent of the value of the item tagged
Tags need to be disposable or fitted for life
Unquantifiable safety and security benefits are often sought and achieved

The US Food and Drug Administration will make tagging of up to 20 billion prescription drugs a legal requirement in the US, the TREAD Act will create a tire tagging market in the US and many new high priced retail items will enjoy the excellent paybacks currently found with apparel in the UK, China and Japan. China will rapidly adopt item level tagging. Globally, healthcare supplies, tools and assets are being urgently fitted with RFID for safety, security and cost control, including theft reduction. Boeing and Airbus are progressing the tagging of aircraft parts and equipment. Over ten million test samples for blood (Europe) and milk (New Zealand), drug research and other uses have been tagged with the potential of billions yearly.

However, it is challenging to meet the most sophisticated requirements for item level tagging and to evolve appropriate technical specifications and approval procedures for, say, mission critical aircraft parts. At the other extreme it is tough to get down to the price that justifies tagging a can of soda in a supermarket or a letter. Item level tagging has therefore started with the many lucrative intermediate requirements as shown below and it is rapidly widening in scope.

Evolution of item level RFID by tag price showing earliest date of mass adoption of leading application in each price band is shown below

Source: IDTechEx

Projected value of item level RFID tag sales by application in 2016 is as follows

Source: IDTechEx

Change in technology

The technology will change. Today we have most item level tagging being HF, with smaller but significant amounts of Far Field UHF and some 2.45GHz and LF (125-135KHz) tags. Within five years Near Field UHF will become popular and in ten years a significant amount of item level RFID will be done without a silicon chip, sometimes by direct printing. The average price of just under one cent for an item level tag in 2016 will cover a range from 0.1 cent primitive ink stripes and thin film transistor circuits to $8 tags for aircraft parts to high specification and even more expensive military tags. Some tags for dangerous, expensive or mission critical items will have batteries and sensors in them and even act as Real Time Locating Systems (RTLS) on assets in hospitals, museums, art galleries etc not just in supply chains.

The table below shows that the larger potential markets for item level RFID promise a wider range of benefits. They may not be as price sensitive as is popularly believed.

* May rise to 1000 in ten years as East Asia expands
Source: IDTechEx

IDTechEx has newly researched this subject in great depth including extended visits to China. (For example, the State Monopoly Tobacco Administration sells 37.5 billion packs yearly and is keen on RFID for anticounterfeiting). IDTechEx has now produced the world's first in-depth report on item level RFID, the most lucrative and soon the largest RFID market. As befits the importance of the subject, in dwarfing all other forms of RFID, the report extends to two volumes - "Item Level RFID Volume One: Forecasts, Technology, Standards" and "Item Level RFID Volume Two: 100 Case Studies, Paybacks, Lessons Learnt". For more see www.idtechex.com/item.

TI inks RFID smart label deal

2006-12-10T23:21:00.000+05:30

Texas Instruments Inc announced a multi-year deal to supply its next-generation RFID silicon to smart label maker Moore Wallace.

Under the deal, TI becomes the primary supply of ultra-high frequency EP Gen 2 flexible inlays for new Moore Wallace RFID labels.

Specifically, TI's RF silicon components would be inserted into Moore Wallace's RFID thermal transfer labels, which customers can encode with RFID as well as print barcodes and text onto. The result is a label that is EPC Gen 2 ready.

Gen 2 is currently being reviewed by the International Standards Organization as the first global RFID technology standard. It is widely expected to get the green light from the ISO by early next year.

Under the deal, Moore Wallace would be able to make more than 500 million Gen 2 smart labels annually using TI silicon.

"[The deal] is unprecedented from the context of Gen 2 production readiness," said Enu Waktola, TI's EPC retail supply chain marketing manager.

Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

This likely would be the first of many deals with RFID label markers for TI's Gen 2 inlays, said Erik Michielsen, director of RFID at ABI Research.

"This is significant in that it demonstrates how RFID solutions are ramping up for high-volume Gen 2 deployments," said Michielsen. "This is a big step for TI in that this is probably is the initial opening announcement for their Gen 2 label partners. I imagine there'll be more to come."

Waktola said the agreement with Moore Wallace was not exclusive and that TI also is working with other label makers.

It makes sense that TI struck its first Gen 2 label-making deal with Moore Wallace, one of the world's biggest makers of RFID labels, since the companies have been working together on RFID since 1998. "We are leveraging the relationship and production capabilities that we can bring together to the market," Waktola said.

While smaller silicon makers, notably Impinj, are also marketing Gen 2 inlays, Michielsen said partnerships between large companies such as TI and Moore Wallace give the RFID industry Gen 2 supply stability and clout. "It sheds a positive light on the future for Gen 2," he said.

The TI-Moore Wallace deal also points to where Gen 2 RFID product volumes are headed next year, Michielsen said.

Moore Wallace sells its RFID labels to between 30% and 40% of so-called compliance program suppliers in the US today, said Nancy Mitchell, Moore Wallace's RFID product manager. That is, companies who comply with the RFID mandates of large goods purchasers such as Wal-Mart, Target and the US Department of Defense.

Most of Moore Wallace's RFID customers are consumer goods product makers, Mitchell said. Industrial manufacturers, which include the DoD, are its next-largest group of customers, followed by pharmaceutical makers. While drug makers are fast adopting RFID, she expects this customer mix to remain unchanged for the next year or so.

TI's Waktola said she expects Gen 2 RFID hardware, such as readers and printers, to be on the market this quarter.

The new Moore Wallace smart labels are currently being sampled, with full production slated for later in the third quarter.

Mitchell said a number of consumer goods makers have already begun pilots of the labels and she expects them to convert to Gen 2 during the next two quarters.

Moore Wallace has distribution channels for the new labels in Asia, Europe and North and South America, she said.

Currently, the company would just manufacture the Gen 2 labels in North America and expects production at its plants in Asia, Europe and South America at some future point. "We've been discussing that internally but don't have any specific timelines," Mitchell said.

Source: Computer Business Review

RFID virus created

2006-12-09T22:45:00.001+05:30

RFID tags and the software used to track them can be used to spread potentially harmful viruses and worms, according to research presented yesterday.

In a paper entitled "Is your cat infected with a computer virus?" presented before the IEEE International Conference on Pervasive Computing, three Netherlands-based researchers show how RFID tags can carry malware and propagate via databases along the supply chain.

"The security breaches that RFID deployers dread most - RFID malware, RFID worms, and RFID viruses - are right around the corner," wrote the study's principle researcher, Melanie Rieback, an American PhD student at Vrije university in Amsterdam.

The sky is not falling, of course, and the paper's main message seems to be that RFID software should not implicitly trust the data it pulls off RFID tags. It should be subject to the same security check as any potentially untrustworthy user input.

The paper's title refers to a hypothetical scenario outlined in the paper's introduction, in which a household pet implanted with an infected RFID tag is able to spread an infection to a veterinarian's computer system, with damaging consequences.

Rieback, and fellow researchers Bruno Crispo and Andrew Tanenbaum, found they were able to execute an SQL injection attack against an Oracle database and Apache web server using 127 characters of data stored on a cheap RFID tag.

SQL injection attacks are well-known from the web applications world. Using escape characters and SQL queries, crackers are sometimes able to interface directly with a back-end database, amending or deleting data as they see fit.

In Rieback's scenario, the virus uses SQL injection to write itself to a database whenever the infected tag is scanned. In a real-world scenario, this scan could happen when a pallet of goods arrives at a store or warehouse. New tags entering the system would have the viral code written to them.

"The manipulation of less than 1 Kbits of on-tag RFID data can exploit security holes in RFID middleware, subverting its security, and perhaps even compromising the entire computer, or the entire network," she wrote.

Rieback's paper outline a few other types of attack that could work from RFID tags. Even though RFID tags are limited in the amount of data they can store, she found that buffer overflow attacks are even possible, due to looping commands permitted by the RFID spec.

The research could open intriguing new possibilities in the field of virus propagation research.

Old floppy disk viruses spread along social networks, as friends and colleagues physically swapped disks and used them on their own computers. In a similar way, mobile phone viruses that spread via Bluetooth also require physical proximity to spread, much like their biological counterparts.

Email worms also spread along social lines, but over greater distances, using their victim's address books to find targets. Network worms have tended to have simple algorithms for randomly generating IP addresses to attempt to spread to.

There are not believed to be any recorded cases of malware designed to spread along the supply chain, but the new research seems to indicate that is at least a possibility.

Source: CBR online
By Kevin Murphy

Nike + iPod Sport Kit RFID Flaw

2006-12-08T18:27:00.000+05:30

You've no doubt seen them: those fitness buffs jogging in the neighborhood or park with their Nike shoes and the tell-tale white iPod earwires, listening to music while getting healthier. They might just be the owner of the RFID-enabled Nike / iPod Sport Kit, which lets runners monitor their efforts.

But researchers from the University of Washington think that a security flaw in the Sport Kit (which uses an active RFID tag) lets stalkers also monitor runners. They claim that someone with a scanner can track a jogger's regimen from a distance of up to 60 feet, even from a car. They could go as far as skimming RFID data and recording jogging times and even plotting routes on Google Maps for later use. [Info Shop via RFID News]

While this potential threat shouldn't be taken lightly, one thought comes to my mind. The average human being isn't going to go to such lengths. Anyone who does go to all that effort to stalk someone doesn't need to utilize the Sport Kit flaw to do so. Their sickness would prompt them into doing it by other methods. In this scenario, I think, it's the person and not the technology that's to blame. On the other hand, this flaw can be exploited by more than just stalkers, possibly encouraging borderline personalities into surveillance activities that they might not otherwise bother with.

Source : RFID Gazette

RFID tags used to teach English

2006-12-04T09:19:00.000+05:30

When you see the acronym RFID (radio frequency identification) in a paper, you immediately think about how Wal-Mart and other big retailers plan to replace bar codes. But two students from Purdue University got a brilliant idea and are using this technology to teach English to non-English-speaking children. Their Merlin’s Magic Castle (MMC) software uses RFID tags technology that the students embedded in toys. For example, when a child holds a toy firetruck with an embedded tag, MMC computer screen displays "fire*ruck" and asks the child to supply the missing letter. The MMC software is currently compatible with several games including Trivia Game or Scavenger Hunt. And now the two students plan to sell licenses to big game companies.

For example, here is a picture of little kids touching a fire truck with a RFID tag and trying to find the correct answer (Credit: Purdue University).

Here is how — and why — MMC works according to "Learning with Merlin"
(Purdue University Insights, Fall/winter 2005).

Merlin’s Magic Castle runs on a computer and uses Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology that the students embedded in toys. When a toy is run over the computer’s scanner, the program registers that RFID, and as Merlin says the toy’s name, it also appears on the screen. "These multiple levels of stimulation (audio, video, and haptic [touch]) influence better comprehension and information retention," said project leader Alexei Czeskis, a junior double majoring in computer science and math, and minoring in Russian.

Below is a picture of Amicia Elliott and Alexei Czeskis, the two students who developed Merlin’s Magic Castle (Credit: Purdue University).

As you can guess, MMC has not been widely covered yet. Anyway, here is a link to a presentation of MMC which gives some more details (PDF format, 5 pages, 41 KB).

Merlin’s Magical Castle (MMC) is designed to be a fun way to supplement classroom education. Whether in school or at home, children can find learning exciting with this tool. A friendly wizard greets the children at the start of the computer game and gives them various options of what they can do. There is an assortment of games a player can choose from, such as: Trivia Game, Scavenger Hunt, Fill in the Blanks, Category Quest, etc.

These games involve interaction between the toys of interest and the computer, which can identify the scanned toy and give the children feedback as they play. For example, in the Trivia game, Merlin gives the player a hint about the toy that he is looking for. If the player scans the correct toy, Merlin cheers, if the toy that was brought to Merlin was incorrect, he’ll offer another hint. Category Quest, presents the player with a toy and asks them to find other toys that are similar. This game involves abstract thinking — one has to be able to identify the similarity between a dog and a cat because both have four legs.

MMC comes equipped with computer software, a scanner, and electronic tags which are embedded into appropriate objects. In the current version of MMC, tags are implanted in toys. When this toy is brought near the antenna, the tag is scanned and its identification number is sent to the computer. The computer will then identify the toy.

Now the students plan to sell licenses to their software to established companies such as the Walt Disney Company or toy manufacturers like Mattel and Hasbro. Good luck to them!

Sources: Various web sites

India Adopts 865-867 MHz for RFID

2006-12-03T21:31:00.000+05:30

Regulators in India recently designated 865-867 MHz as the country's UHF RFID spectrum, in line with the frequencies used by the United States and Europe.

In a move expected to kick-start RFID adoption among Indian companies, regulators in India recently designated UHF RFID spectrum in accordance with the frequencies used by Europe and the United States.

The Wireless Planning and Coordination (WPC) wing of India's Ministry of Communication assigned the 865-867 MHz UHF band for use by radio frequency identification devices. The ruling was part of a process initiated by EPCglobal India, a joint industry-government initiative that is leading the development of electronic product code to support the use of RFID.

"India has a strong export economy, so getting this spectrum was an absolute must," says Ravi Mathur, CEO of EPCglobal India, which is based in New Dehli.

Clearing the spectrum in India will enable Indian manufacturers to tag shipments of goods to meet the UHF RFID requirements of customers in Europe and the United States. Prior to the ruling, each use of the UHF spectrum for RFID required special permission from the WPC. Until now, Mathur maintains, some Indian pharmaceutical companies supplying tagged shipments to Wal-Mart have been forced to do so after the products have already arrived in in the United States, where the UHF spectrum for RFID is 902 MHz to 928 MHz. Because Wal-Mart and other retailers are requiring more of their suppliers to tag shipments of goods, Indian companies will increasingly be expected to tag their exports, as well.

Tags that comply with EPCglobal's Gen 2 standard are designed to operate between 860 MHZ to 960 MHz without degradation in performance. Thus, Indian companies will now find it much easier to encode and read tags on goods shipped, regardless of whether those goods are bound for the United States or Europe (where the UHF spectrum for RFID is is 865 MHz to 868 MHz).

Being able to use the 865-867 MHz UHF band for RFID will also be a boon to India's high-tech businesses. "The Indian software industry is in a position to be a major provider of RFID systems solutions [to the United States and Europe], but it needs to be able to test and develop RFID. In addition, chip manufacturers are also in discussions about producing RFID chips in India. With the spectrum allocated, Indian companies can work with UHF RFID without requiring special clearance," says Mathur.

EPCglobal India is also hoping to see an Indian university become one of the Auto-ID Labs—a federation of research universities that has evolved from the now-defunct Auto-ID Center and is dedicated to researching and developing new technologies and applications for revolutionizing global commerce.

India had originally considered allocating 2.4 GHz as the spectrum for UHF RFID, but EPCglobal India argued that having UHF spectrum incompatible with that used by the United States, Europe and other key markets would have seriously limited the ability of India's businesses to stay in step with RFID adoption elsewhere around the world.

"Our objective was to ensure that RFID spectrum in India would [provide] important access to the world markets," says Mathur.

EPCglobal India says its petition to the WPC faced initial opposition from both India’s military and railways, which had previously had had access to the 865-867 MHz spectrum. In its application to the authority, EPCglobal says it was supported by allocation of the UHF spectrum that had already taken place in the United States and Europe.

Source : RFID Journal

What is RFID

2006-12-02T15:34:00.000+05:30

Transponders (also called tags or labels) help to identify any kind of articles , for example containers used in logistic processes. The applied technology is known as RFID (Radio Frequency IDentification) technology. A distinctive feature of this technology is, unlike the barcode label technology, that a reader decodes the data encoded in the tag. This reader generates a radio frequency field which not only serves as the power source of the tag but, at the same time, transmits the captured data - in a non-contact and non-line-of sight way. Tags can be read through non-metallic substances such as glass or plastic located between antenna and tag.

Metal has a shielding effect. Unlike barcodes the RFID technology provides the possibility of re-programming identification and/or object data on the tag whenever it is required, which means the tag can be written electronically.

A basic RFID system consists of three components: reader, antenna (connected to the reader) and a tag, attached to the object to identify.

Giving priority to the development and production of readers, scemtec supplies all-including systems consisting of data base software, readers, antennas and tags. In addition, system studies are provided by scemtec in order to support their customers in choosing the most suitable include-all system.

The reader consists of either micro processing electronics with a serial interface or a handheld terminal with integrated reader. In addition, an either internal or external antenna is required. The writing and reading ranges depend on the shape of the tag. Simple reader modules (proximity reader) have short ranges of only several centimeters, whereas those of the long-range readers are up to 2 m long. The bigger the tag is the longer are the ranges.

Tags come in various types. There are tags of different memory sizes or they are categorized as either read-only or read-write tag. Therefore, scemtec developed the so-called “multi-standard” reader, a reader, especially developed to read and write to any type of tag.

At present RFID systems usually operate at 125 kHz or 13,56 MHz in Europe. scemtec offers multi-standard readers for both frequency ranges.

Tags have numerous advantages. A summary:

Tags are used to identify and trace any kind of objects, for example containers Identification of the object does not require line of sight. That means, opening of the container is no longer required and it stays intact

The data transfer from tag to reader is not affected by dirt, ice, water , scratches etc. The tag could even be embedded in plastic

A variable data storage allows in-use data modifications
Process security is given due to the circumstance that password protected tags additionally could be encrypted in order to prevent others than the authorized readers from reading or modifying data
High data security because of the fact that transponder data are complete, unchanged and saved at any time
Certain tag types allow a simultaneous reading of several tags (anti-collision mode)

Tags provide a wide range of applications, just to mention a few:

Product identification
Process- ad production control
Process- and production inspection
Warehouse management
Merchandise protection
Merchandise tracking
Ticketing
Access control
Animal identification
Container identification
Sports-Timing
Traffic control

Source : Scemtec

Solar Powered RFID Reader Measures Road Traffic

2006-12-01T12:45:00.000+05:30

The portable device holds promise for deployment in areas and under conditions for which a permanent RFID installation would be too expensive or impractical.

Nov. 17, 2006—Transportation researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and the New York State Department of Transportation (DOT) are testing a solar-powered mobile RFID interrogator that will monitor traffic flow by reading EZPass tags attached to passing cars. Motorists use the tags to pay for bridge and highway tolls wirelessly. Last week, Rensselaer began testing a single RFID reader on Jordan Road in Troy, N.Y. In the spring, they plan to hold a pilot involving six solar-powered readers.

New York State currently monitors traffic flows on certain roads via 15 permanently stationed readers, which collect data from the EZPass tags. The new solar-powered portable solution provides a method of monitoring traffic flow for situations where it's too costly or unnecessary to install a permanent RFID reader—such as on roads where construction is underway, or on those traveled heavily only for special events.

The portable RFID unit, dubbed mGate, connects to a laptop computer via a USB cable, with batteries charged by a solar panel. Operators load the unit onto a trailer hitched to a truck for transport. When deployed alongside a road, the unit’s laptop sends the encrypted tag ID, timestamp and reader location via a wireless Internet connection to the Rensellaer server.

The system will ultimately be used to calculate how long it takes traffic to move from one installed RFID reader to another. However, the current pilot is only testing read rates. Eventually, traffic data from the mGate system could be used to reroute traffic when congestion looms, or to alert motorists via signage or the Internet about slow-moving road conditions, reducing the need for employees to identify problems as they arise.

Researchers received a $3.9 million grant from the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) to fund the program, says Jeffrey Wojtowicz, a research engineer in civil and environmental engineering at Rensselaer.

Source : RFID Journal

Groundbreaking FDA Approval of RFID Technology

2006-12-01T10:23:00.000+05:30

Its another Groundbreaking FDA Approval of RFID Technology

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved the marketing of another RFID-based technology for use in healthcare: the SurgiChip, whose goal is to "prevent wrong-site, wrong-procedure and wrong-patient surgery." An RFID chip, encoded with surgery information such as patient identification, date, procedure, and assigned surgeon, is stored until the day of surgery, when it is affixed to the patient's body with adhesive and only removed once the surgery begins. At numerous points in the process, the chip-encoded information is scanned and verified by the patient, an error-checking technique that balances technological automation with the patient's own expectation of treatment. Illinois-based label and printer maker Zebra Technologies is providing the RFID hardware for the system.

Despite numerous high-profile stories of this FDA approval, the product appears to be in only the earliest stages of marketing; the surgichip.com website includes a mere three pages of product and company information.

Read the article at FDA.gov

Source : RFID Update

RFID Prevention of Wrong-Site Surgery Gains Momentum

2006-11-29T22:33:00.000+05:30

RFID's adoption by the healthcare industry made progress this week with the announcement by AMTSystems of new pilot programs for its SurgiChip product. The SurgiChip, which was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in November, uses an RFID-based verification system to "prevent wrong-site, wrong-procedure and wrong-patient surgery." Industry analysts estimate that between five and eight surgeries per month are performed in which an incorrect part of the body is mistakenly operated upon. While only a very small percentage of the total number of monthly surgeries, those few mistakes can cause dreadful and traumatic outcomes.

The Palm Beach Orthopedic Institution of Palm Beach, Florida, is one site where the SurgiChip is being used successfully to prevent such mistakes. The hospital has performed about 300 surgeries since implementation of the system a year ago. The cost of SurgiChip falls between $6 and $9 per surgery for the first year, then decreases to $3 the second year. AMTSystems provides the software and integration, while the RFID printers, labels, and associated hardware are products of Illinois-based Zebra Technologies.

Healthcare is an area of increasing focus and innovation among RFID technology providers. In niches like the SurgiChip's, RFID offers extremely high-value opportunities to protect against human error. In other cases, RFID is a way to provide asset tracking for the expensive equipment and instrumentation found throughout hospitals. Patient-tracking is another area of interest, in which an RFID tag is worn that not only signals the patient's whereabouts but also includes encoded medical history information that can be scanned with an RFID reader-equipped PDA. A doctor can then immediately and accurately access the patient's medical history. A related concept is that of the controversial VeriChip, the human-implantable RFID tag that includes an ID number by which an unconscious or otherwise unidentifiable patient can be looked up in a master medical history database.

The field is early yet, and the solutions rather immature. Hospitals are notoriously conservative spenders, so selling them on new-fangled technology is only possible through the demonstration of very compelling benefits. Regardless, there is reason to be optimistic: a report came out just last week predicting that "RFID and its related technologies in the hospital marketplace will skyrocket to $8.8 billion by 2010."

Read the SurgiChip release from AMTSystems

Source : RFID Update

Out on a Limb

2006-11-28T15:18:00.000+05:30

Students at the University of Washington in Seattle are using RFID tags to identify trees that have been genetically modified to grow quickly.

Graduate students at the University of Washington in Seattle have gone out on a limb with a project that involves embedding RFID transponders in trees. The idea might not be as wild as it sounds.

The university’s Precision Forestry Cooperative was set up with funding from the state legislature to use advanced technology to improve conservation techniques in the forestry Industry. In 2002, after two years of preparation, students embedded the tags in two-year-old saplings to see if RFID could be used to identify trees that have been genetically modified to grow more rapidly. The trees are planted and monitored. Eventually their seeds are harvested to create a new generation of faster-growing trees. Big money was invested in the genetic modification, so the seeds of the original saplings are very valuable.

“We have used plastic ribbons to mark trees, but the trees are often vandalized by hunters and others,” says Gerard Schreuder, acting director of the cooperative. “Embedded RFID tags are not visible, and they remain in the tree throughout its life.”

Students embedded a 134.2 kHz glass-encapsulated transponder from Texas Instruments in each sapling. Each tag has 80 bits of read-write memory, which can be used to store a serial number and other data about the sapling. A scientist with a handheld computer equipped with a reader can go to an area of the forest where genetically modified saplings have been planted, scan the tag and gather data on the tree in the field.

Trees grow from the top, so the transponders stay at the same height. New growth forms around the transponder, so it becomes completely embedded in the middle of the tree trunk. Because of the moisture in the tree, the only way to get a reading is with a low-frequency tag. That limits the read range to about 2 feet.

The limited read range is a shortcoming, but Washington’s forestry service is still interested in the system. The service is required by law to protect the trees in watersheds and along rivers and streams. Based on the university’s pilot, the service believes that RFID could help it more quickly identify trees in a particular area. An RFID system could also potentially reduce the amount of time, paperwork and money needed to gather data on millions of trees across the state.

Schreuder says the cooperative hasn’t taken the RFID research beyond the pilot stage, but he hopes to soon hire a new director who can pick up where the students left off. In the meantime, the project has piqued the interest of several forestry companies. In addition to employing RFID to monitor genetically modified trees, some are considering branching into new areas, such as using the tags to certify the quality of wood. Which suggests that RFID could, indeed, take root as a means of tracking trees.

Source : RFID Journal

Microchips tag stray Delhi cows

2006-11-28T06:58:00.000+05:30

The authorities in the Indian capital Delhi have turned to microchips to tackle the growing problem of stray cows roaming the streets.

Delhi has about 40,000 cows roaming the streets

A court had earlier ordered authorities in south Delhi to offer a reward of $45 to anyone delivering a stray cow.

The authorities then sell the cow to a new owner but they are concerned people might take advantage by bringing back the same cow for the reward.

A $11 microchip in the cow's gut will now show a cow already brought in.

Protected

Commissioner of the local municipal corporation, Rakesh Mehta, said the chips would allow resident welfare associations to determine whether the cow brought to the local authorities was a stray one or not.

"Otherwise, people can sell their own cows for quick money," he said.

Following the earlier Delhi High Court order, a number of cows and buffaloes have been brought to the authorities by people eager to receive rewards.

Cows are revered as sacred among Hindus and are protected by law.

There are nearly 40,000 thought to be roaming the streets of the Indian capital.

Officials say unauthorised dairy farms are one of the main causes.

They say stray cows pose a serious traffic hazard.

This week a woman broke her arm after a cow being chased by residents slammed into her.

Source : BBC News, New delhi
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/4141296.stm

RFID in the Air Industry and Land Transport

2006-11-25T14:43:00.000+05:30

With IATA's decision to settle on one standard for RFID tags in airline baggage that sector of the market is due to rise from $20 million in 2006 to $100 million in 2016. RFID will also be used by airlines to tag crucial aeroplane parts and by airports to improve security...says Dr.Peter Harrop of IDTechEX

As the RFID business grows strongly from $2.8 billion in 2006 to $26 billion in 2016, transport will be taking its fair share. A seminal decision was the unanimous vote of IATA, in October 2005, to settle on only one specification for the world's baggage tags, this being based on the UHF frequency band. This was courageous, because UHF works well with dry, non-metallic environments such as retail apparel in the UK and books in shops in the Netherlands, where there are few readers to interfere with each other but air baggage is none of these things. The technologists are wrestling with that one but in Europe and East Asia it is largely a waiting game as they hope for easing of UHF radio regulations to something nearer to the power levels, signalling protocols and bandwidth enjoyed in the US. However, few countries are willing to match the US regulations. Work rounds are on the way and the seven million or so airline bags that are lost yearly in the world, at a retrieval cost of about $100 a time, must surely reduce some time soon.

The split of value sales of RFID systems including tags in the air industry is shown below.

Figure 1 Percentage spend on RFID systems including tags exclusively for the civil air industry by application in 2006

+ includes trailers, Ground Support Equipment GSE, buses, cars, trucks, taxis etc.

*baggage trolleys, food trolleys, Unit Load Devices ULDs, pallets, baggage conveyor containers etc

Source: IDTechEx

Figure 2 Percentage spend on RFID systems including tags exclusively for the civil air industry by application in 2016

Source: IDTechEx

Boeing and Airbus are energetically introducing RFID on parts and equipment to reduce counterfeiting, automate status checks and make the supply chain more efficient. Virgin Atlantic, FedEx and others are deeply involved. UHF is preferred but there is interest in HF where appropriate.

In transport in general, there is a boom in RFID tickets and cards to improve security and speed of transaction and some are increasingly usable for general purchases. Twenty million of the new e-passports are being issued this year, with their RFID labels for security and automated recording of movements. That figure will soon reach 40 million yearly as over 50 countries adopt them. Over eight million ExxonMobil Speedpass key fobs are in use for purchases at gasoline stations. The 4.5 billion credit, debit and account cards from Visa, MasterCard, American Express, JCB and others are gradually being issued in RFID form so they transact faster and are more reliable and longer lived. The first 20 million were issued last year. Well proven HF is used for RFID for ticketing, bank cards and passports.

However, nothing stands still for long in the RFID business and there is now great interest in locating people and things with RFID. For example, one major airport is trying to figure out how to make all people in the airport carry something that lets them be located at all times, the better to eliminate queues and improve evacuations and security. Tracking freight and baggage with the off electronic reader here and there and making heroic assumptions about what happens in between is all well and good but we need Real Time Locating Systems RTLS. These usually consist of RFID at 2.45 GHz because, at this license free frequency, you can locate things using time of arrival from interrogatory beams or be parasitic off pre-existing WiFi networks or use peer to peer ZigBee RFID. However, this is a very busy frequency like UHF and there are a lot of interference issues. The good news is that the cost of RTLS systems and tags is tumbling down. The tag no longer drains its battery in a short time, it is smaller and other impediments are largely overcome. RTLS on vehicles, assets, freight and even people - when they volunteer for queue elimination and other delights - is on its way.

For more read "RFID in Airports and Airlines 2006-2016"

Hot Countries for RFID

2006-11-24T17:42:00.000+05:30

It is well-known that the adoption of RFID is happening around the globe. But where are the success stories and in which market sectors? The below excerpt is an Independent research and analysis on RFID by IDTechEx. This highlights the leading adopter nations, the big spenders and surprise niches for RFID implementation.

IDTechEx keeps a close eye on which countries are eagerly adopting RFID and which are not. Our sources include intensive travelling, conferences, literature searches and our IDTechEx RFID Knowledgebase of over 2300 case studies covering over 2500 organisations and 85 countries. The results are rather surprising.

Firstly, the US is the greatest adopter, with by far the largest number of cases of RFID in action and orders that are often the world's largest by value. It has even pulled ahead in the last year, with over 840 recorded projects. More surprising is the UK holding second place by number of cases, though not the money spent, where China has more claim to fame and Korea and Japan are strong rivals.

The top ten countries by number of case studies are shown below but it did not look like this only one year ago. China and Korea have jumped up a notch and, remarkably, Australia has jumped from number ten to number seven. When we saw the unusual activity in Australia we focussed research onto the region for a new report RFID in Australasia 2007-2017 www.idtechex.com and we reveal some of the results here. New Zealand is a follower, with the exception of the work of Fonterra, the world's largest milk cooperative.

What is going on in Australia? The rapid advance of Australia in RFID is on a broad front, from books in libraries to tagging of humans in hospitals, but one could say that about many countries. What sets Australia apart from most of its peers are aspects such as the legal requirement to tag cattle and racehorses, and the trials and rollouts of tagging fish, tomatoes and other foods by its vibrant food industry. Australia will not stop there. It is likely to introduce legislation to tag all four legged livestock ahead of most other countries. With the major trading blocs finding reasons to protect their food industries, external suppliers such as Australia, with the world's largest population of sheep, must be beyond suspicion. RFID is a part of that.

In the Books, Libraries and Archiving sector, Australia is doing more than its size would indicate. The same is true of the Financial, Security, Safety sector which exhibits considerable innovation. For example, we have RFID being used to track police vehicles, criminals in correctional facilities, paedophiles and even forensic samples. That breadth of approach is not seen elsewhere. RFID is used in passports and payment cards and many mass transport card schemes in Australia. One interesting result is that, although Australia mimics the world as a whole in having HF read-write passive RFID dominate its markets, low frequency use comes next not, as so often elsewhere, UHF. LF tags are used on marathon runners' shoes and bicycles etc in other races, on a wide variety of animals and on conveyances in Australia.

Number of case studies in the IDTechEx RFID Knowledgebase for the top ten of 85 countries.

Source: IDTechEx

Applications of RFID in Australia

Source: IDTechEx

A contrast to Australia is given by another country of similar population and economic size - the Netherlands, which is also unusually active in applying RFID. Primarily, this is based on use of RFID cards and other RFID in the leisure sector, such as in football matches. The Financial, Security, Safety and the Logistics and Postal sectors are also big users of RFID in the Netherlands, with item level tagging by RFID labels an important way of applying RFID there. One thing is common to Australia and the Netherlands: both use High Frequency (HF) far more than any other frequency for their RFID. That is also true of the world as a whole.

Applications of RFID in the Netherlands

Source IDTechEx

'F' in RFID

2006-11-23T11:01:00.000+05:30

Before mass-market retailers like Wal-Mart or government agencies issued mandates that companies use RFID products that met specific criteria (such as that set forth by EPCGlobal’s Gen 2 specification), RFID was more a curiosity in the supply chain. When the technology was used, it tended to be in closed-loop applications where a single party controlled all aspects of the deployment (in contrast to Gen 2, a global interoperable standard with wide adoption by hundreds of companies).

With standardization and proliferation, the need to understand the different ‘flavors’ of RF tags and readers was underscored. Here’s how they’re different:

Ultra High Frequency: The Gen2 preference for long range, rapid reads

Ultra High Frequency (UHF), the most commonly utilized frequency for Gen 2 supply chain operations, runs in the 902-928 MHz band in North America, and somewhere between 860-960 MHz internationally. UHF is known for its longer read range (typically cited up to 30 feet rather than the three feet maximum typically defined for HF). Generally, the wider the allowable bandwidth, the more information you can transmit in a shorter period of time.

“Most Gen 2 is UHF because its longer read range and higher data rates make it ideal for retail applications,” says Mr. Melling. “If I have to reach 100 palates as they come through the door, I need to have both the range required to read the tags and the throughput to process that data quickly.”

But there are a few disadvantages to UHF. First, the tagging of objects that contain liquid or metal – two elements that can disrupt radio signals. “Metal reflects it and water absorbs it,” notes Sara Shah, ABI Research. Under normal circumstances, the metal in the object being tagged and the tag’s antenna form what’s called a parasitic capacitor the unintentional presence of which can diminish the tag’s ability to receive power from the reader.

The end result: “it looks dead – it won’t respond to a reader,” notes Clarke McAllister, CEO of ADASA. But companies are coming up with clever ways to combat that problem, Mr. McAllister notes. The manufacturer of a portable tag encoder (i.e. a mobile tag issuing device) recently unveiled its FAT tag (Foam Attached Tag)” for businesses interested in attaching Gen2 RFID tags to metal parts and liquid containers in their supply chains. FAT tags are thicker than standard tags (about an 1/8 of an inch thick), so they can reduce the problems that kill signals in these environments.

Adds Ms. Shah: “Some vendors offer solutions that use Ultra High Frequency bands around metal and water environments but they use various techniques to mitigate these issues, like encase the tag in plastic.”

Some concerns have been raised that the spectrum set aside for UHF RFID differs slightly across the globe – 902-928 MHz in North America and 865-868 MHz in Europe, for example. As Symbol’s Melling points out however, this is not a concern if tags are built correctly. Readers may be slightly different, but it is relatively easy to build one tag that works well globally. Even if your product travels through China or Japan, into Europe, and then back to the states, the same tag responds to all the frequency bands. “You’re not moving readers from country to country, you’re moving tags,” Mr. Melling says.

High frequency: Short range, secure, and resistant to metals and liquids

High-frequency (HF) RFID resides within the 13.56 MHz band in North America, and around the globe. As a frequency, it’s older and more established than UHF, but has a shorter wavelength, which means it can generally only be read within a couple of feet (or as little as 10 cm according to key international standards). Because of this, it’s the frequency most associated with today’s RFID-based payment and access control applications like contactless smart cards or event tickets. HF’s most notable advantages are that it works better around metals and liquids than UHF, and that it is well-established internationally.

“The real strength is there’s been a global standard for high frequency tags for a long time, you can pretty much use high frequency bands anywhere in the world no problem,” Mr. Melling says. “But the read range is a limited.” In addition to read range, another limitation is its speed: HF operates much slower than UHF, which is why most mass-market retailers and suppliers use UHF tags and accompanying products. But just as with UHF, there are ways to circumvent the ‘read range’ issue, says Mr. McAllister. “Companies like Impinj have demonstrated that UHF antenna structures can be made to fit onto small bottle caps and such. “There are many examples of how both HF and UHF are breaking barriers in size and speed.”

While HF might not be suitable for moving large containers across a supply chain, it is the frequency of choice for one of the biggest, burgeoning RFID small-scale supply chain operations: pharmaceutical tracking and tracing.

“If you take a look at the use of RFID in pharmaceutical applications, you’re talking about putting very small tags on very small items – the primary focus being track and trace that will enable an electronic pedigree,” says Matt Ream, senior manager of RFID Systems at Zebra Technologies, a printing solutions provider that manufactures HF and UHF RFID labels, among other things. “One of the biggest concerns about UHF technology is that UHF technology has not been approved for use on biological agents.”

In other words, UHF technology could potentially raise the temperature of live biological drugs such as vaccines, and render them ineffective.

Right now Zebra and partner Magellan Technology, developer, manufacturer and licensor of advanced read and write 13.56 MHz RFID systems, are working on a product that makes automated pharmaceutical processes faster and more secure – debunking two myths about slow speeds associated with HF, says Mr. Ream.

As RFID begins to be incorporated into pharmaceutical supply chain operations, a major concern of pharmaceutical manufacturers is slowing down line speeds.

The HF technology Zebra is working on with Magellan can program and verify 45 tags per second, more than six times faster than existing HF and UHF products, Mr. Ream says. The technology runs on ISO 18000-3 Mode 2 technology, yields high read rates, and uses a different modulation technique from other HF technology (called Phase Jitter Modulation or PJM).

“It really communicates differently from frequency modulation and amplitude modulation,” says Mr. Ream. “PJM communicates data by shifting the signal’s phase versus the frequency or the amplitude found in most other RFID systems, allowing you to speed up your primary communication speed.” Additionally, the tag has the ability to return the signal on any one of eight return channels: One output channel from the reader and eight simultaneous return channels, increasing the number of tags you can read by a factor of eight.

Low Frequency: 'making hay' with animals and closed loop applications

Low Frequency (LF), the third most commonly used RFID frequency in North America, isn’t a direct competitor in the arena of applications that require any sort of range, but is highly useful for closed-loop applications. Running at frequencies in the bands from 125 kHz to 134.2 kHz, some of the most common LF RFID applications are livestock tagging, Exxon Mobile’s Speedpass, and certain access control applications. Because of its shorter wavelengths, it is better able penetrate objects like glass windows. “(A major application) is the use of Low Frequency tag in automobile ignition systems,” notes Mr. McAllister. In most modern cars, a tiny LF tag is built into the ignition key – a reader in the steering column authenticates the key and allows the car to start

Looking to the future …

So, will UHF become the dominant standard for all supply chain applications? Will more sophisticated additions continue to help solve the metal-water challenges presented by UHF? What applications will we see more of in the future?

“That’s a huge question,” says Mr. McAllister. “Everyone’s watching with interest what the market’s gonna do – because there’s a number of innovations going on. I perceive a big huge play for either HF or UHF is in item level tagging. The question remains, which one will the market choose to adopt for large scale item-level tagging for pharmaceuticals and retail?”

Source: RFID News

Gaming Gets Physical with RFID

2006-11-22T12:20:00.000+05:30

New generation of games use ID technologies to bridge gap to virtual environments

The days of gaming were once spent with crowded rooms of onlookers peering into a fluorescent screen being brought to life by millions of electrons firing down a tube. Over recent years the technology behind the playing field of video games has changed as smaller, thinner, and more visually defined displays emerged. But just as high-definition television sets have now started to work their way into the mainstream, a new way to experience video games has started, ever so slightly, to fall into the gaze of the tech savvy public. It’s a way to play games that takes human interaction beyond pressing buttons or waving controllers at a screen, instead relying on direct human movements and locations to act as inputs. And identification technologies – barcodes, RFID, and smart cards -- are making it possible.

Live action gaming for the physical world: Pac-Man and La Fuga go RFID

Pac-Man – a classic franchise that has been around nearly as long as video games themselves – recently made the transition to a new medium. A group called Mobile Radicals created a mixed reality game that uses mobile phones and RFID technology coupled with human bodies running around a playing field. The game is played almost identically to the classic formula with teams divided up into ‘ghosts’ and ‘Pac-Men’ (only in this game they’re known as Pac-Lan, just to avoid any copyright issues). Situated on the field is a series of color-coded discs, each with its own unique RFID tag. Each Ghost and Pac-Man is uniquely identified by an RFID tag worn in the costume. Pac-Lan can also read the location of the ghosts in relation to the last pill that he collected, and just like the classic arcade game, the hero can collect power pills so he can hunt down and kill the ethereal stalkers who then have to restart at the center of the map.

A similar game has popped up across the pond, in Madrid, Spain. A company called Négone opened an interactive game called La Fuga (The Breakout) in which up to 300 participants dawn passive RFID tags (meaning that they don’t require a power supply) and a PDA attached to a wrist strap. The objective of the game is to escape from a futuristic prison environment that contorts itself depending on player performance. As contestants move into different sections of the playing field their location is picked up by several RFID readers that tell the game system to spit out questions to the PDA on the player’s wrist. Answer the questions correctly and the pathway continues to open up, doors popping open like something out of a new-age horror movie. Get out of the prison before time runs out and victory is yours.

Similar technologies are in fact nothing new to the realm of live action games. Laser tag games at local amusement parks have been using identification technologies for reload stations for some time. Players who run out of “bullets” have to run within the range of a reload station, and then press a button to recharge the ammunition. Each team has a separate reload station, and each gun has its own unique ID signature, making it possible for the station to differentiate between a friendly gun, and the gun of an enemy. But the level to which these new games rely on the ID technology is revolutionary.

Video games systems test RFID for player ID and character interaction

In recent months, ID technology has increased its reach into the video game industry itself. During the spring Electronic Entertainment Expo, Sony Executive Phil Harrison showed the world a game called The Eye of Judgment that makes use of ‘ID signatures’ on the back of playing cards. Ken Watanabe, the mastermind behind nearly everything to do with Sony’s Playstation, dubbed the signatures “Cyber Codes.” They are actually 2D barcodes that interact with a standardized 3 x 3 playing surface and Sony’s EyeToy (essentially a digital video camera) that reads the barcodes. As the cards move along the playing surface, the character that each represents mirrors those movements on the display screen.

In Japan, a number of arcade games have been using trading cards to dictate character movements and even to store a player’s information so they can come back to the arcade and pick up where they left off.

But, arguably the largest step forward for RFID-based gaming is Mattel’s announcement of their HyperScan console, a system that is totally based around radio frequency identification and the possibilities it affords users. The system is scheduled to ship for the 2006 holiday season, and should retail for around seventy dollars. Games will cost about ten dollars, and will come complete with six, RFID equipped, trading cards. Apparently each trading card is an active RFID tag, meaning that they have a standalone power source. Sadly that also means that each card has a limited number of hours of play. Mattel has been quoted as saying that the amount could range from 20 to 40 hours, depending on the specific use of the card.

Will RFID bring new appeal or simply hinder the gaming experience?

How will the games play, and how will they benefit from RFID technology? The HyperScan website indicates that the system will come with a fairly standard looking video game controller, while the RFID integration will come in the form of character cards. The website calls it “scanning in” whereby players will scan a character into the game and then be able to play as that character. The demo shown is an X-Men fighting game, where characters from the Marvel Comics universe are scanned into the system to do battle with one another. Chances are Mattel will have to come up with more inventive uses for the RFID aspect of the console, beyond what will likely seem little more than scanning a barcode. To truly make a noise in the already crowded gaming industry, the company that has traditionally been responsible for dozens of children’s games will have to find a more innovative way to bring RFID to the masses.

There’s no question that radio frequency identification has begun to work its way into the minds of game developers, but to truly become a viable additive to the games industry they’ll have to think up truly creative uses for the technology beyond just storing information. It seems as though the arcade trading card games are the next logical step, with different movements and positions dictating the movement and position of characters on the screen. But will this be enough to make ID technology an integral part of gaming’s future? Like so many things, only time will tell.

Source: RFID News
Article by: Nate Ahearn, Contributing Editor

Operators want RFID in phones

2006-11-21T19:01:00.000+05:30

David Meyer ZDNet UK

Published: 20 Nov 2006 16:57 GMT

Mobile phones could have moved a step closer to being used as credit cards, car keys and concert tickets, after operators around the world said they would work together on the technology.

The GSM Association (GSMA), which represents operators serving more than 40 percent of the world's phone users, said on Monday that it was pushing for a global standard on near field communications (NFC).

The short-range wireless technology would be based on having a radio frequency identification (RFID) chip embedded in the handset, along with some sort of NFC software. As for cost, a GSMA spokesperson told ZDNet UK on Monday that "we don't have a figure for it but we reckon it's a relatively modest cost to add it to the handset".

There could be wide-ranging applications for such technology. "You could have it as a key for your car — it would recognise who you are, open the car door, put the right music on the stereo, that kind of stuff," the spokesperson said. Such a phone could also act in a similar way to Transport for London's Oyster card, itself an NFC device, or as a payment device in shops

A user could also use the phone to download a concert ticket which would then be recognised by an RFID reader at the venue, suggested the spokesperson, who added that NFC would, in effect, let you "integrate both your wallet and your keys into your mobile phone".

However, the timeframe for phones with integrated NFC remains unclear. The GSMA's spokesperson said the organisation was hoping to submit a white paper on the subject to the NFC Forum and the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) by the end of this year. Beyond that, said the spokesperson, "it depends on how fast those particular bodies move".

The GSMA represents operators around the world. The 14 operators working together to develop business cases and user requirements for NFC include Orange, Vodafone and 3.

Nokia brings RFID to mobile phones

2006-11-16T22:47:00.000+05:30

This article is an addendum to my last article on Nokia's plan on fusioning mobile phones and RF Identification. Nice read on.

Nokia brings RFID to mobile phones

Nokia is attempting to push radio frequency identification (RFID) into the mainstream with its launch of a kit that adds the technology to its mobile phones.

The company said that by combining its Nokia Mobile RFID Kit with a standard handset it has created the first GSM phone product with RFID reading capabilities.

The kit, which was unveiled on the opening day of the CeBIT IT trade show, can extend the mobility of field force personnel by integrating RFID reader technology into "familiar" mobile phone-based devices, according to the mobile phone giant.

The product can improve task and workflow management, providing businesses with a new way to collect data such as meter readings and time and attendance information, said Nokia.

Part of the company's field force product range, the kit uses the 13.56MHz radio frequency range at the very short range of typically 2-3cm using the ISO-14443A standard.

By touching RFID tagged objects, users will be able to initiate tasks in their Nokia phones, call and send text messages, access databases and record new data entries.

"The phone reader will read the content of the smart object and translate it to an action," said Gerhard Romen, head of market development at the Nokia Ventures Organisation, in a statement.

"For example, a field service engineer can intuitively start browsing the latest service instructions to repair a machine on site."

The Nokia Mobile RFID Kit, which will be available from this summer, contains two Xpress-on RFID reader shells compatible with the Nokia 5140 mobile phone, application software for the phone and 20 RFID tags.

Nokia Unveils RFID Phone Reader

2006-11-12T14:04:00.000+05:30

The world's largest provider of cell phones is offering a kit that will enable workers to scan tags remotely and transmit data via their cell phones

March 17, 2004—Nokia, the Finnish cell phone maker, today unveiled the world's first RFID-enabled GSM cell phone at the CeBIT2004 trade show in Germany. The Nokia Mobile RFID Kit features two RFID reader shells—plastic housings that fit over a cell phone—20 13.56 MHz tags and software to enable mobile workers to scan tags and access information remotely.

Nokia expects the kit to appeal to companies such as Halliburton and Schlumberger, which provide field services for the oil and gas industry, as well to utilities and companies providing security for buildings.

"About two and a half years ago, we started looking at RFID as a way of empowering people to do things," says Gerhard Romen, head of global market development at Nokia New Growth Business, the product development unit that created the RFID kit. "Today, RFID tags tend to be mobile and readers are stationary, but things get really interesting when you turn that around and make the tags stationary and the readers mobile."

The RFID phone might be used by a engineer in the field checking a meter on a gas pipeline or other industrial equipment. The engineer would scan the tag attached to a meter to identify which meter was being read. The phone-reader would record the time of the read, and then the engineer could key in the meter reading into the phone using the buttons on the phone. The data could be stored in the phone and downloaded to a PC via an infrared connection.

Data can also be transferred via the GSM system. For example, a security guard walking a building could read a tag at each door whenever the guard checks the door to confirm it is locked. That information could be sent to a control center via the cell phone, and someone in the control center could monitor the guard's progress in real time.

In another application, a telecommunications repair technician could read a tag on a malfunctioning switching station or other remote asset. The phone would be programmed to go to a specific Web site to download a service history and a schematic diagram of that switching station to the cell phone. The engineer could then learn what previous problems that site had and which cables are carrying electric current.

Another feature triggers the phone to call a predefined number when a particular tag is read. So for instance, a security guard might scan a tag on his belt when in trouble and the cell phone would automatically call for help.

The software for the reader is written in the Java programming language. Nokia has a community of developers who create software for the phones, and Romen says he expects these developers to create new applications for customers.

The new RFID reader works with the Nokia 5140, a GSM phone that is water resistant and more rugged than a typical cell phone. Users simply slide off their existing Xpress-on cover and slide on the RFID reader. The software needed to run the reader is automatically loaded into the phone and the reader becomes operational.

The readers, which are made by third-party manufacturers that Nokia is not identifying, use the ISO 14443A communication protocol, so companies that purchase the kit can buy additional tags from Philips Semiconductor and other vendors. The read range is typically 2 to 3 centimeters (0.8 to 1.2 inches).

Nokia has been working with several companies over the past year to test how convenient and easy to use the device is. This is an important issue, according to Romen. "We've been testing it in the energy, gas supply and security industries," he says. "One of the key things with a new technology is understanding the requirements of end users who are not IT experts. Can they read the screen without glasses? What happens if I drop it? How long does the battery last?"

Romen says that the battery in the cell phone will last several days when reading 50 to 80 tags per day. The company believes there is a significant business market for the device, but also expects consumers will eventually discover the benefits of using their cell phone to control RFID applications. While it will be several years before consumer applications are common, he envisions consumers one day scanning items in stores and automatically downloading information on the product from the Web, or scanning the tag on a product to register it with the manufacturer.

Pricing for the RFID kit, which will be available at midyear, will be set by Nokia resellers. Several companies, including Minec and Magnatec Technologie, sell a handheld, GSM-enabled computer that can be equipped with an RFID reader. These sell typically sell for $1,200 to $1,500. The Nokia kit should be significantly less than that, since the GSM-enabled phone is sold separately and it doesn't have all the capabilities of a handheld computer.

Source : RFID Journal