By Eric Fetters
Herald Writer
As researchers try to make electronic tags that can hold more information in a smaller space, Everett-based Intermec Technologies Corp. is finding new uses for its version of the smarter bar code.
Stephen Schwartz, an Intermec systems engineering manager in Dallas, Texas, said the company’s "smart labels" are already being tested or used by Wal-Mart, a video rental chain and the U.S. government.
Within the industry, smart labels are officially known as RFID — radio frequency identification — tags. As a longtime maker of bar code reading and writing equipment, the new technology was a natural for the company, spokeswoman Kathie Anderson said.
"When RFID technology first became available, many thought it would replace bar codes. What we’re finding now is that it’s a complement rather than a replacement. There’s a need for both," she said.
Development of the company’s RFID tags, marketed under the name Intellitag, took place in Everett and in Intermec’s facilities in Iowa, New York and France, Schwartz said. They are manufactured in the United States and Asia.
Each tag can hold 100 bytes of information, far more than a traditional bar code, and the information can be rewritten hundreds of thousands of times.
Tracking loads of merchandise as they are shipped from manufacturing plants to warehouses to individual stores is one of the best uses for the tags, Schwartz said. CHEP, one of the world’s largest suppliers of shipping pallets, recently chose Intermec’s tags for part of a major pilot project using RFID technology.
Procter &Gamble and Wal-Mart also are using the Intermec tags as they test new inventory tracking systems in the Midwest.
There also are potential uses in the automotive industry. For example, Intermec has a role in the development of a tire-tracking system by the Automotive Industry Action Group. In light of last year’s massive recall by Firestone, the industry is trying out flexible radio frequency tags imbedded in tires.
"You will begin to see tires coming off the assembly line with RFID tags" that can be matched with vehicle identification numbers, Schwartz said. "That way, if there is a recall, they will be able to know exactly which vehicles have the tires."
At a few stores owned by Movie Gallery, the third-largest video rental chain in the nation, a new self checkout system is using the tags as well, Schwartz said.
"You take your two or three videos or DVDs up to a kiosk and it scans them, and then you put your Visa in and the kiosk automatically bills it," Schwartz said. When a customer turns in the videos, a scanning device can record down to the second when the tapes or DVDs were returned, he added.
The U.S. government also has begun using Intermec’s labels to control access to Fort McPherson in Georgia. Trucks and other vehicles used at the base now have radio frequency tags on their windshields. A scanning device at the front gate can instantly read the tag and give information on the vehicle and who is authorized to drive it, Schwartz said.
Internationally, the Chinese government is using Intermec scanners to read RFID tags on pallets and trucks as they pass through checkpoints.
Schwartz said he thinks Intermec is well-positioned in the market as interest in radio frequency identification technology grows. But he agrees that the high-tech tags may never be practical for everything.
"You’re never going to replace bar codes," he said. "It’s always going to cost more to put an antenna on a silicon chip than ink on paper."
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