Very-low-cost RFID tags have just jumped closer to reality. BiStatix, a new technology from radio giant Motorola, appears to have made an end run around some of the costs that have kept RFID prohibitively expensive for mass-market applications. By using inexpensive carbon-based ink, BiStatix is able to print antennas on paper, doing away with costly metal coil antennas used by most existing RFID solutions. The cost of this antenna, says Motorola, is a fraction of a penny while a metal antenna can add as much as 20c to the cost of a label.
The new antennas which can be printed in virtually any size and shape, are bonded to an integrated circuit (IC) chip that is exceedingly small and thin and roughly as thick as a business card. Whereas traditional electromagnetic (inductive) tags are constructed using a metal wire coil and a resonant capacitor to gather energy to power the silicon, the BiStatix electrostatic (capacitive) tag uses two planar-printed electrodes on a paper substrate. Depending on the size of the antenna, the label has a read range that varies from several inches to several feet. As with standard RFID tags, the label can be read through various materials, including wood, plastic, the human body and walls.
Data written on the chip can later be updated or removed or simply read. Alternately, information can be locked into the chip permanently, creating a read-only tag. The label or tag holds 1000 bits of information, of which roughly 900 bits are available for use.
Equally as significant as its small size and relatively inexpensive price is BiStatix's reported compatibility with legacy bar code printers. One major scenario envisioned by Motorola is for end users to retrofit existing bar code printers with add-on BiStatix units. In operation, the modified printer would dispense an RFID label simultaneously with the bar code label, the RFID label being applied underneath the larger bar code label. So applied, the chip and antenna are both camouflaged and protected.
The tags can be read after being folded, crumpled and even ripped, says Motorola, plus, they can conform to surfaces that bend and flex. According to a statement from Motorola, the BiStatix technology "delivers a significant enhancement to earlier generations for RFID technology and is an ideal solution for the tracking and efficient routing of potentially billions of objects, including baggage, packages and goods". The market for RFID tag applications is projected to grow more than 200% in North America by the year 2000, according to a recent statement from the research firm of Frost & Sullivan, Mountain View, California.
Commensurate with the announcement of the BiStatix technology, Motorola also said that the US Postal Service is using the technology as a key tool in a major pilot project called Surface 2000 which will test new ways of automatically capturing data while loading and unloading mail containers on postal vehicles. The USPS is integrating RFID into its existing bar code systems in order to enhance delivery times and better provide consistent and accurate service.
Following the announcement of the BiStatix technology, Industry Scan contacted Rich Krueger, Director of RFID Business Development for Motorola and picked up some more information about the new technology. Following are excerpts from an inteview with Krueger.
IS: How long has the BiStatix technology been in development?
RK: About 31/2 to four years. It has been a fairly long-term activity.
IS: How big are the labels?
RK: They can vary from postage-stamp size all the way up to a refrigerator-crate size, if you wish. For instance, in the USPS pilot programme, there is a wide range of labels and forms being used.
The way we have designed this is that on the back of a traditional bar code label there would be a release liner which would have the BiStatix-printed antenna and the IC. The IC is thin enough so that it is going to be pretty hard to even feel it through the label. This would be on the back side of the label which would then be adhered to whatever object you would normally associate it with.
IS: Is it not still going to be relatively expensive to create a label that includes a chip and an antenna?
RK: Actually not. I can give you a kind of substractive analysis of how it would compare to other technologies. On the bar code side of things, it is the cost of paper and that is always going to be cheaper than printing the antenna and adding an IC to it. But we still believe that the BiStatix cost is going to be less expensive than what is out there in the market today, that is, an integrated circuit plus a pre-stamped antenna or a wound antenna or etched or some sort of a pressed-aluminium antenna, plus a capacitor - because it is a tuned circuit - plus the attendant process to actually solder all that together into some sort of an insert. So if you subtract out the IC cost, what we are basically saying is that all of that other stuff is not in the BiStatix technology.
IS: Does this require a special substrate?
RK: The substrates can include paper, plastic, a wide range of substrates can be used and supported. In fact, we see this as not only being appropriate for bar code enhancements but it is also perfect for identification and access control badges.
Our whole objective has been to perfect getting that IC onto a paper antenna. And then that substrate - the combined antenna and IC - can be integrated into (a wide range of) applications. If you need extensively long read ranges and you want to move big cartons on a conveyor, well maybe you print out a 305 x 610 mm antenna on the inside of the label or somewhere inside the carton.
IS: Do you have a good example of a potential application?
RK: In the case of transportation and airlines, one could foresee putting into the IC not only the existing bar code information that you get from a passenger boarding pass or bag tag but you could also enter the full itinerary of the passenger, the origin, destination, all the intervening stops, interairline transfers - all of that information can be entered and updated as the object, passenger or bag moves from point A to point B to point C. Because the IC that we are providing allows you to either lock the information into selected memory locations or leave it unlocked and modifiable, you can update this as you go.
Another example would be a tracking application such as a work-in-progress, say, and a top-level unit manufacturing process. Over time you are adding additional functions and operations to that object, including the information into the IC as you go, eventually completing the process of manufacturing. Then comes shipping the product and now you have a point of departure, time of departure, target location and so forth.
You can also include in this, as you push out further into the distribution channel, instead of having just a simple EAS device, you can document on this RFID device the price that was paid, location where it was sold and the date and time. Later, if somebody, for example, were to bring the item back, you would know exactly what the price paid was, which would help eliminate gray marketing and counterfeiting.
IS: Have you looked into the price-sensitivity of some of the markets you are targeting?
RK: Yes, and we think we can be competitive. We know that we are never going to get down to the price of a bar code label which can be fractions of a penny. But we know that in markets where you are talking about not thousands or millions but maybe billions of items per year, that is a metric that will help drive down the cost of the IC.
I could not guarantee that we could provide a cost-effective label for a 25c packet of gum but I can say that you could cost-effectively put this on a carton of gum where you have a 24-pack.
The ultimate question is probably, "When are you guys going to get down to a 'nickel' tag?" All I can tell you is that by having eliminated the metal components, the capacitor, the tuning and all of that expensive process to make that tag and instead, just putting the IC down on a printed antenna, we think we have achieved the lowest cost-basis.
IS: How heat-resistant are the labels?
RK: They are as resistant as the lowest common denominator which for instance, might be the bar code paper's level of heat resistance; the paper will fail before the IC does.
IS: Will the ICs be manufactured by Motorola?
RK: Yes, by Motorola and licensees.
IS: Are the labels permanent?
RK: Yes. This is a 1000-bit device, of which about 900 user bits are available for the application. They are organised into 32-bit blocks and there are roughly 28 blocks of memory; each of those blocks has a lock that you can set and forever prevent the changing of information in that block. Or you can leave it unlocked and then modify the contents if the application calls for it.
IS: Who will manufacture the readers?
RK: We would be manufacturing, for a wide range of applications, both the readers and the reader/writers. We would also be working with third parties in specific vertical markets to get our programming and read/write technology into bar code printers. It is our intention to offer standard reader/writer OEM modules and the software programming tools.
IS: How far away are you from having read/write devices available?
RK: The plan is to have products actually flowing by the fall of 1999.
IS: Do you have a feel for what the pricing might be for these units?
RK: I really do not have that information at this point.
IS: What do you envision the read range to be for the labels?
RK: It depends on the combination of the BiStatix tag itself, plus the size of the reader and the field it is creating to read the tag. I would suspect that, depending on the combination(s) of these two factors, we are talking anywhere between several inches to several feet.
IS: Do you see this technology as having real potential in retail?
RK: Absolutely. In fact, our initial approach here has been to get the lowest-cost memory element that we can and moving forward, we have added an EAS function to it so that you can actually enable the tag to work in an 'alert' mode, so that it can be shut off at the POS. The EAS function requires one bit - either 'on' or 'off' - and we have roughly 900 bits. We certainly have the EAS connection but initially we are taking BiStatix down the supply chain path, as opposed to the retail path.
IS: In the upcoming USPS pilot programme, what will be the advantage that BiStatix has over bar code?
RK: As in many organisations, they are missing reads (on packages) and they are having to send the items around the conveyor again to be reread. A second reason is that for the bar code application, unless you have got a $100 000-$200 000 scanner that can do six sides and all angles, you need to have very clear singulation of each item and good alignment of the bar code to the readers as they are going through. If not, you have to use a handheld and we have witnessed where that is exactly what they are doing - they are taking the packages and putting them dead-on square on the conveyor. In other cases, they are putting them close to dead-on and someone has a handheld that they are using to scan.
The RFID scenario is about cost-efficiency and saving labour and that is really where the USPS is coming from.
IS: Is BiStatix being or is it going to be, tested at sites other than the USPS project?
RK: The answer is yes but at this point that is information that we cannot divulge. However, in addition to the USPS pilot programme, there is a considerable amount of internal testing going on at Motorola.
IS: What do you consider to be the top three applications for this new technology?
RK: What we see at the very top is this tracking inventory/supply chain scenario. That is an absolute right-on application for this. The second one is the transportation/transit/airline boarding pass/bag tag type of application, where you really are driving it toward paper-based solutions that exist today. And the last one is general identification or ID, in which we are talking about access control, resorts, theme parks, time and attendance - those kinds of applications where it would be amenable to a paper-based kind of substrate. We think it is perfect for lowering the entry cost and improving the efficiencies in those markets.
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