Malaysia opts for RFID licence plates

Malaysia has decided to switch to RFID-enabled licence plates in an attempt to reduce car theft, reports The Inquirer.

Each RFID chip will contain information about the vehicle and its owner, enabling traffic authorities to identify stolen vehicles even if the licence plates have been changed.

The report says the new system will be phased in, starting with new vehicles next year. The new system will also standardise the size of the numbers and letters used for licence plates.

The US National Stroke Association (NSA) says RFID can play a critical role in medical treatments by helping identify patients in emergency situations, reports the TUV Product Service.

The NSA says a new RFID patient information system uses chips that are implanted in patients and read by handheld scanners. Once the patient is identified, the system gives healthcare workers access to patient information that is vital to delivering the right treatment.

According to the report, the VeriMed system is the first one of its type to be cleared for use by the US Food and Drug Administration. The system approval is expected to affect further medical product legislation.

An increase in the uptake of RFID technology within the retail industry this year has failed to materialise, according to analyst IDTechEX.

The UK Computing Web site reports that the research into the progress of RFID in 2006 found limited pallet and case tagging in the retail industry due to technical problems and price issues. IDTechEX says although retail will eventually be the biggest market for RFID, consumer goods companies are yet to see sustainable return on investment.

The research shows that in the next few years, other sectors such as the airline industry and government institutions will be among the biggest RFID users. The airline industry expects to tag an increasing number of the two billion items of luggage it handles each year the UK National ID card scheme is likely to surpass China's as the biggest RFID rollout in the world.

The market for RFID printer-encoders is expected to surge in value to $209.3 million in 2012 from $10.7 million in 2005 to achieve a compounded annual growth rate of 53%, according to research firm Frost & Sullivan.

RFID Update says Frost & Sullivan expects the growth to be driven by the ever-increasing adoption of Gen2 RFID in supply chain applications. The firm also says companies in vertical markets represent a particular area of opportunity for printer-encoder manufacturers.

Frost & Sullivan says the relatively affordable cost of doing in-house label production with an off-the-shelf RFID printer-encoder is likely to prove attractive to slow adopters seeking the least disruptive way of making the transition.

The Chinese government is said to be putting special emphasis on the development of RFID technology because it envisages that large-scale implementation of this technology will increase efficiency in supply-chain management and availability of accurate and relevant data.

According to a Media Syndicate report, experts say there's immense scope of high-frequency RFID systems in China and government support for RFID systems is greater than ever.

The report says industries, such as manufacturing and transportation, are likely to be major purchasers RFID technology in the run up to 2009. Thereafter, China's retail industry is expected to begin implementing RFID for end-to-end supply management

An Israeli company has developed a new backscattering UHF RFID tag that allows paper manufacturers and their downstream partners to track paper reels, reports Industry Week.

The ForReel UHF RFID product from the Tel Aviv-based PowerID division of Power Paper, addresses the limitation of having to place a passive RFID label on the core of the paper reel by providing an active UHF tag that can be read from any direction.

ForReel operates in the ultra high-frequency range, 850-960MHz and is capable of read ranges of up to 10 metres away from the reel.