UHF Gen 2 RFID Chip Samples Start Shipping March 2, 2005

The long-awaited Gen 2 chip samples have started shipping to radio-frequency identification technology equipment makers for evaluation purposes.

Scott Medford, VP of RFID at Intermec Technologies Corp., confirmed receipt last week but declined to reveal the maker's name. "The Gen 2 chips were delivered to a handful of hardware equipment, tag, and inlay manufacturers, including Rafsec, KSW, and Intermec," he says. "We are making labels with the Gen 2 chips, and they'll be ready to test with our readers next week."

UHF Gen 2 specifications promise to unify RFID deployments. The benefits are expected to include lower equipment prices and the ability of companies to collaborate on the same frequency worldwide.

The specifications are heralded as the first UHF RFID open architecture completely designed by a committee. Supply-chain benefits dependent on Gen 2 are global interoperability, international vendor support, multiple read/write capabilities that could potentially change the economic climate by delivering a quicker return on investment, and data-communication speeds at more than double tags available today. The projected read rate for Gen 2 tags in the United States under a simulated environment is 1,500 per second, versus roughly 100 per second for tags available today.

EPCglobal Inc., the nonprofit organization spearheading RFID adoption, finalized the UHF Gen 2 specification in December. Then vendors began promising delivery of tested and validated UHF Gen 2 RFID tags sometime this year. Texas Instruments Inc. expects to deliver chip samples between April and June.

At RFID World in Dallas on Wednesday, Edward Gonsalves, business-development manager for Philips Semiconductors, declined to comment on a report from a source close to the company that Philips this week became the first vendor to ship UHF Gen 2 chips.

Both Philips and Texas Instruments have said they will begin producing chips based on the next-generation standard this year. In December, Philips said it plans to have its first devices ready in the first quarter and mass production in the third quarter. Texas Instruments has already been making sample chips based on the next-generation specification and will ramp into volume production in the millions per month by the third or fourth quarter.