IBM, Philips, RFID venture
IBM and Philips say they’ll work together in RFID sales (Radio Frequency Identification) business.
RFID chips are on the verge of usurping your friendly, neighbourhood bar codes, courtesy of VeriSign of domain name fame. Or infamy, depending on where you sit.
VeriSign manages the Internet’s core directory – and has been criticized for trying to take undue advantage of its position. It’s now been selected as the directory manager by EPCglobal, "a venture formed to administer the radio-frequency tagging network that is expected to begin replacing bar codes as product identifiers over the rest of the decade," says an Associated Press report quoted here.
Philips’ semiconductor unit will make the chips, but no financial details were disclosed, says a Reuters story here.
The "market opportunity of RFID tags" is estimated at $3.1 billion by 2008, according to research group Applied Business Intelligence, says Reuters. "Another research group, IDC, estimates that retail demand alone will be $1.3 billion within four years.
"Philips said it would be its own customer when later this year it tags wafer cases and carton packages at its semiconductors Kao Hsiung manufacturing site in Taiwan and the division’s distribution center in Hong Kong."
