Research Articles

IDTechEx has recently travelled to major RFID events in Europe and North America. Here are our conclusions on industry progress so far until mid 2007.

The market for RFID continues to surge forward, with investments, acquisitions and orders at record levels. The premier European IDTechEx conference RFID Europe, on the 18-19 September in Cambridge UK, will air all these aspects.

Airports and airlines have been trialling RFID baggage tagging for at least fifteen years. There has been significant delay while they kept trialling incompatible solutions. However, that has now changed.

With about $5 billion being spent on RFID in 2007, of which about $2.24 billion is for tags, what are the favourite RFID specifications?

The prices of RFID tags and systems vary widely between applicational sectors. To some extent this is driven by their various levels of required complexity but the primary driving force is the competitive landscape of both the user and the supplier.

The main emphasis of RFID use and supply has radically changed course. That was the message of the large IDTechEx RFID Smart Labels USA event in Boston last week. The business is booming in just about every sector other than the supply of pallet and case tagging to retailer and military mandates.

IDTechEx has interviewed key RFID adopters and solution providers in the various applicational RFID markets. This research has been analysed in a brand new report giving an unprecedented level of insight into the total RFID industry and what is really happening. Raghu Das, CEO of IDTechEx, summarizes some of the findings.

In 2007 IDTechEx expect that 1.71 billion tags will be sold. The total RFID market value (including all hardware, systems, integration etc) across all countries will be $4.96 Billion. This research for the IDTechEx RFID Forecasts, Players and Opportunities 2007-2017 report has been used to put together an unmissable line-up of speakers that you need to hear and learn from.

Working Group for IEEE Rubee™ Network Standard meeting in Boston on Feb 20

Novel, Water-based Conductive Ink from Acheson Improves RFID Antenna Production

In the last few weeks alone, orders for well over US$100 million of contactless (ie RFID) smart cards and associated systems have been placed. The business is surging forward with the percentage of smart cards that are contactless rising to 16% of deliveries in 2007 after having been stuck at around 5% for the preceding twenty years. Learn more.

The RFID business is booming on a broad front, with most sectors profitable, aside from the shakeout in supplying readers and labels for consumer goods companies.

RFID is being adopted worldwide but with very great differences of emphasis as revealed by the IDTechEx Knowledgebase of over 2450 case studies in 92 countries. This is a tale of four, very different continents.

In 2007, approximately 650 billion articles will be sent through postal and courier systems around the world. After retail, the tagging of each postal item is the next largest potential market for RFID by volume of tags. There are numerous significant RFID roll-outs in this sector which are under publicized, and here Raghu Das from IDTechEx summarises the latest progress.

As we enter 2007, many RFID suppliers are licking their wounds, while for others, RFID business is booming. As IDTechEx interview solution providers and users across the RFID industry for the new report RFID Forecasts, Players & Opportunities 2007-2017 to be released in January, Raghu Das, CEO, summarizes some of the findings.

CEO's from the creme-de-la-creme of the pure-play RFID companies that are leading the market as well as stealthy start-ups will gather in Boston on February 20 at the RFID Investment Summit to meet with investors.

With the launch of an RFID Investment Summit to be held in Boston on Feb 20, Raghu Das, CEO of IDTechEx looks at the recent investor interest in RFID and particularly active RFID and Real Time Locating Systems.

Over 200 people attended the second annual IDTechEx Active RFID Summit in Atlanta, Georgia in November. There were many positive remarks about the event and delegates expressed particular interest in Real Time Locating Systems (RTLS) this year.

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

From inception to creating - all you need to know about manufacturing low cost high performance RFID

Where are the RFID success stories and in which market sectors? Here Teresa Henry highlights the leading adopter nations, the big spenders and surprise niches for RFID implementation.

Has the pallet/case market for RFID tags and other hardware become the nearest thing to a black hole in the RFID universe in 2006, thanks to reluctant mandated customers, technical problems and pricing for volumes that never came?

RFID technology is moving on apace in some areas. Certainly EPC Gen2 tags have demonstrated spectacular performance improvements when tagging cases and pallets. However work is still needed.

At IDTechEx, when we teach Radio Frequency Identification (RFID), we talk of it being a ubiquitous enabling technology like the wheel or paper. After all, RFID is now used from Bulgaria to Namibia, from Azerbaijan to Vietnam and Antarctica. There are well over 10,000 RFID projects out there and there are over 1000 suppliers that have now landed substantial orders for the specialist RFID hardware and services involved. Yet things have barely started.

With the ability to track, locate and sense, Active RFID is being rapidly adopted around the World, often creating new markets. Many adopters have reported a rapid return on investment (ROI) of 12 to 18 months which is leading to active RFID being a $6.78 billion market in 2016. Here Dan Lawrence summarizes the topic for the forthcoming IDTechEx Active RFID Summit event.

IDTechEx is delighted to announce the sixth annual RFID Smart Labels USA 2007 conference and exhibition which will be held in Boston, MA, Feb 21-22, 2007. Covering all the RFID applications and technologies, the event focuses on the business case for RFID, item level tagging, RFID progress around the world and state-of-the-art technologies. Register early and save.

The IDTechEx RFID Smart Labels Europe Conference and Exhibition on September 19-20 broke new ground, showing how the subject has moved on. Here are some highlights of the event.

Contactless smart cards are the largest RFID sector by far and the business is booming. As a result of the reduced cost of the latest contactless systems IDTechEx forecast a boom in RFID smart cards.

On Tuesday delegates from 29 countries will meet in London at the IDTechEx RFID Smart Labels Europe and Active RFID Europe events. See the latest unmissable speaker additions and event updates.

The September edition of the IDTechEx monthly journal, Smart Labels Analyst, is free. Follow the link to download your copy.

In RFID, the amount of acquisition activity is picking up fast but is still well below what the market demands. With about 1000 companies doing something significant in the RFID value chain and mergers being less than the rate of formation of new RFID companies, there is scope for much more M&A activity and for the weak to disappear.

An analysis of 75 case studies from 18 countries of Active RFID in action shows the hot sectors in this technology vertical.

While many agree that China will become the largest market for RFID, few know of what is going on there or even companies involved in the sector. Therefore IDTechEx technical consultant Ning Xiao has toured China visiting RFID companies, users and the government to uncover the latest developments. IDTechEx has discovered progress from dozens of Chinese companies and surprising major RFID activities. In this article Ning Xiao summarises his learnings, which can be read in full in the IDTechEx journal Smart Labels Analyst.

If you are looking to raise money for your business involved in RFID, Printed Electronics or Smart Packaging, IDTechEx can offer free help.

The correlation between the volume and pricing of RFID tags has been a much debated topic in recent times. Here is Dr Peter Harrop's forecast on pricing for the next ten years and his justification behind the figures.

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.