October 31, 2006
Young shoppers want to pay with chip in skin (UK)
Teenagers are more open to the idea of having a high-tech shopping experience, the Tomorrow's Shopping World report suggests.
Around 8 per cent of 13 to 19-year-olds were open to the idea of microchip implants while 16 per cent wanted trolleys to be fitted with SatNav systems.
October 30, 2006
"Unmanned hotels"
A new project to develop ¡Èunmanned hotels¡É in Japan may soon eliminate the burdensome task of checking in at the front desk. A consortium of five companies, including the trading company Itochu and consumer credit provider Orico, are working to develop a network of hotels that rely on an online reservation and payment system, RFID-enabled Orico credit cards that serve as keys, and RFID-enabled door entry locks.
China's first National RFID Industrial Zone
China's first National RFID Industrial Zone opened in the Zhangjiang area of Shanghai. Manufacturing lots of tags, using tags at shopping malls, and of course food traceability:
In the future, the entire pork processing system in Shanghai--from the birth of pigs to the pork sales at the market--will be monitored by the tags so consumers can monitor the quality of their purchased products.
via ChinaTechNews
October 12, 2006
Asian RFID Standards Discussed
According to Nikkei Shimbun (Oct 4), nineteen Asian countries including Japan, China, Korea, Mongol, and Vietnam started discussing RFID standards for data inputs and communication. It seems that these will be a key discussion topic at Asian Forum for Information Technology
October 11, 2006
China Plans RMB128 Million For RFID Programs
The 20 RFID programs include super frequency RFID anti-collision technology; RFID middleware research; RFID public service systems and framework design; RFID tag and antenna design technology; RFID system testing technology; RFID information integration and management technology; and RFID industrialization.
October 02, 2006
Hitachi to release WiFi RFID Location System
Hitachi will soon release a new version of Air Location (see the entry "Hitachi releases WiFi Tags", a positioning system using WiFi RFID tags.
The combined features enable thorough and precise management of people entering a building and information about the position of individuals within. In emergencies, the emergency message function allows users to send a message to the control center, automatically informing disaster relief officials of their whereabouts.
via JCN Network < RFIDNews
October 01, 2006
Hitachi to Sell "mu-Chip Hibiki" aka 5-yen tag
Hitachi announced on Septermber 29 that they will start shipping their new RFID tags called "mu-Chip Hibiki," mu-Chip Hibiki's price can be as low as 5-yen each, when ordered in volume.
First mu-Chip Hibiki tags will be shipped on November 30, 2006. They will be included in an evaluation kit that includes a reader, an antenna, software tools, and 500 mu-chip hibiki tags. The kit will cost 1,047,900 yen (about US$9000).
They are not perfectly EPC UHF Gen2 compliant at the moment but they will be by the end of next summer.
Related news: Supermarket chain ECO's is planning to use these mu-chip hibiki tags to track 15,000 shopping carts -- Their main objective being prevention of shopping cart thefts.