Sep 8 2010
Enable IPC Corporation revealed that the company has signed a three year time-bound, $4.5 million pact, with a foremost producer of RFID (radio frequency identification) tags and readers, to make available customized ultracapacitor-based devices to enhance the tag reading range. Both companies are hopeful that longer read range for the RFID tags would significantly increase the quantity of tags being sold.
According to David Walker, Enable ‘s CEO, this high tech product with both Enable IPC and SolRayo ultracapacitor technologies, is perfect for RFID tags, and that rapid and inexpensive charging and discharging the power appliances, has a great drawing power in the market. He stated that RFID tags can be seen in many of the applications that are presently used, such as a chip embedded in a pet’s collar or using an EZPass on a toll road. According to market reports, notwithstanding the worldwide economic crunch, the RFID tag market will reach significant heights, growing by an annual 14%. By the year 2014 it is believed that this market could go beyond $8 billions.
RFID tags are made up of a radio antenna and a microchip, and help in broadcasting data using radio waves. These waves are then captured by a reader, which deduces the data. Tags can be of three types active or BAP (battery-assisted passive) or passive. Both active and BAP tags employ a power source to boost the signals, to increase the distance from which they could be read. Enable IPC products would prove to be an inexpensive source of power.
The uses of RFID tags are legion in several industries encompassing applications for inventories, livestock and asset tracking, pets , tires, toll roads, anti-theft appliances, passports, and patient identification to name a few. RFID tags are also used by a few pharmaceutical companies for tracking controlled drugs, and to confirm that accuracy is maintained all through the manufacture and shipping processes. It could be used to collect sums of money electronically either for toll roads or in the form of SpeedPass for ExxonMobil gas stations. RFID implanted Smart Cards or credit cards, have grown by 16%, reaching a value of 675 million in the year 2009. Other Companies such as Visa are also commencing with the use of RFID Smart Cards, to provide expedient payment options for their clientele.
To overcome apprehensions in the field of food safety, a few countries such as Australia, Canada and New Zealand have made it compulsory to track livestock through its life cycle from birth to the point of retail sales using RFID tags. According to IDTechEx, a British Research company, in the future with more and more countries participating in livestock tracking process, the RFID industry would definitely take over the market, reaching values of $6.5 billion by 2017, mostly impelled by government stipulations.
Source: http://www.enableipc.com