Mar 25 2010
The Supervisory Council of the Russian Corporation of Nanotechnologies and the Board of Directors of Systematica Group have approved participation by their respective organizations in a project to establish domestic production of radio frequency identification tags, commonly known as RFID tags. These tags, developed by project applicant Systematica, will be produced using chips with advanced parameters of sensitivity and reliability of information readout.
The total budget for the project is 630 million rubles. RUSNANO will invest 190 million rubles in its realization. Under the project, a new generation of RFID chips—the EPC standard UHF Class-1 Generation-2 chip based on 90-nanometer technology—will be developed and released for production. The technology is being applied to RFIDs for the first time, and it offers breakthrough reduction in size, energy consumption, and cost of the chips. Production will be possible at domestic plants that have mastered 90-nanometer technology.
The new chips will be used to develop new tags and to modernize already existing tags, like the RFID PatchTag™, a leader among passive universal tags in distance of registration. Other tag designs that are specifically oriented to the new chip will be developed: the family of iNano chip-labels will effectively combine parameters of long-distance reading and recording thanks to original antennas with an increased amplification coefficient and a 90-nanometer chip.
Heightened sensitivity and low energy consumption are key advantages of the new RFID chips. The chips conform to international standards in their sphere, opening the door to opportunities for the project to export its products.
Products manufactured under the project will be used primarily in warehouse and transportation logistics, retail trade, libraries and archives, and supply chain management. They will offer highly effective tracking of virtually all material flows in every sector of the economy: machine building, chemicals, light and automobile industry, agriculture, civil and commercial construction, housing and public utilities, energy, defense, and aerospace. Because of the Russian origins of the chips, their use in the government sector, including security and defense organizations, will be simplified considerably.
It is significant that the project is based at an existing business engaged in development and introduction of RFID solutions. Systematica is one of the largest RFID providers in Russia. It offers comprehensive solutions ranging from IT equipment and programming to project integration tailored to the customer’s needs.
“The economic benefit of introducing RFID systems is achieved through several factors impacting the process of movement of goods. For instance, when RFID tags are used, the need for human intervention in the flow of goods from warehouse to showcase is eliminated; no problem arises with absence of goods in the showcase or shortfall in the warehouse. Statistics show that the introduction of RFID technology in warehousing provides a seven percent savings in warehouse turnover in comparison with bar-coding,” RUSNANO Managing Director Sergey Polikarpov noted.
“The state-of-the-art domestic RFID chip will enable Russian tag producers to reduce expenses. Integrated RFID solutions will broaden existing markets and create new markets for sales. We expect that the comprehensive RFID solutions developed within the project with RUSNANO will not only be in demand by our customers but will be used as well by Russian integrators as the technological base for their projects. Systematica Group will promote this technology to our network of resellers, including resellers in the regions. We plan to support our partners in comprehensive and complex integration projects using RFID. Moreover, the company will develop a number of packaged sector solutions to more fully satisfy the needs of our clients,” Systematica Group President Leonid Goldenberg commented.
New production will probably be located at facilities belonging to Systematica in St. Petersburg. In 2015 the company will be able to produce more than 1.3 million PatchTags per year and around 160 million iNano tags. Earnings of the company are expected to exceed 800 million rubles in 2015.