A smart label, also called a smart tag, is an extremely flat configured transponder under a conventional print-coded label, which includes chip, antenna and bonding wires as a so-called inlay.[1][2][3] The labels, made of paper, fabric or plastics, are prepared as a paper roll with the inlays laminated between the rolled carrier and the label media for use in specially-designed printer units.
In many processes in logistics and transportation, the barcode, or the 2D-barcode, is well established as the key means for identification in short distance. Whereas the automation of such optical coding is limited in appropriate distance for reading success and usually requires manual operation for finding the code or scanner gates that scan all the surface of a coded object, the RFID-inlay allows for better tolerance in fully automated reading from a certain specified distance. However, the mechanical vulnerability of the RFID-inlay is higher than the ordinary label, which has its weaknesses in its resistance to scratch.
Thus, the smartness of the smart label is earned in compensation of typical weaknesses with the combination of the technologies of plain text, optical character recognition and radio code.
Processing
The processing of these labels is basically as with ordinary labels in all stages of production and application, except the inlay is inserted in an automated processing step to ensure identical positioning for each label and careful processing to prevent any damage to the bonding. The printing is processed in two steps, including
normal ink-jet printing, except the space with the bonded chip, with clearly intelligible text and
either barcode or 2D barcode for later semi-automatic reading with handheld readers or fix-mount scanners
writing coherently concatenated information to the RFID-chip
reading the written information on the RFID-chip subsequently in the printer for control purpose (read after write)
Customisation of smart labels is available with chip cards. Also combinations of magnetic stripes with RFID chips are used,[4] especially for credit cards.
Printable labels
Replacing silicon processors, smart tags that are printed collect information themselves and process it. The result of decades of research and development by ThinFilm Electronics are “printed transistors, the multilayer tags combine a year’s worth of battery power, sensors and a small display, and will initially be used to show a temperature record of perishable food and medications. Roughly 3 x 1.5 inches in size and consisting of five layers sandwiched in a roll-to-roll production process, the ThinFilm labels use the company’s own ferroelectric polymer technology for storing information. Chains of non-toxic polymers can be flipped between two orientations – representing binary “0″ and “1″ – to store non-volatile data.” [5]
Electronic labels
While price increases when labels are electronic, the very small percentage of labels that are electric is increasing. Electronic labels have features that supersede non-electronic labels. Electronic versions can signal what is happening in real-time and most can store a digital record.[6]
Application
Smart labels are applied directly to packages or to pallets or other shipping containers. The application directly to the product is still of neglectible importance
due to the cost of the labels, which may be justified easier for agglomerations of more than one product
because all metallic, liquid or otherwise electrically not transparent products reflect or reduce the radio waves
due to the handling, which normally addresses the package and lesser the unpacked product.
Use
The technologies with the smart labels are all mature and well standardised. After the first wave of technology hype with RFID, current consolidation in the market shows hard competitive Darwinism. With increasing sales quantities, the inlays are still annually redesigned and appear in releases with new extensions to performance. However, the integration of RFID to handling processes requires sound engineering to ensure the balance of benefit and effort.
In 2008, ThinFilm and Polyera announced their partnership to produce high volumes of smart labels. The collaboration brings printed integrated systems, such as smart sensor tags, closer to commercial availability.[7]
A barcode or bar code is a method of representing data in a visual, machine-readable form. Initially, barcodes represented data by varying the widths, spacings and sizes of parallel lines. These barcodes, now commonly referred to as linear or one-dimensional (1D), can be scanned by special optical scanners, called barcode readers, of which there are several types.
Radio-frequency identification (RFID) uses electromagnetic fields to automatically identify and track tags attached to objects. An RFID system consists of a tiny radio transponder called a tag, a radio receiver, and a transmitter. When triggered by an electromagnetic interrogation pulse from a nearby RFID reader device, the tag transmits digital data, usually an identifying inventory number, back to the reader. This number can be used to track inventory goods.
A barcode reader or barcode scanner is an optical scanner that can read printed barcodes and send the data they contain to computer. Like a flatbed scanner, it consists of a light source, a lens, and a light sensor for translating optical impulses into electrical signals. Additionally, nearly all barcode readers contain decoder circuitry that can analyse the barcode's image data provided by the sensor and send the barcode's content to the scanner's output port.
EZ TAG is an electronic toll collection system in Houston, Texas, United States, that allows motorists to pay tolls without stopping at toll booths. Motorists with the tags are allowed to use lanes reserved exclusively for them on all Harris County Toll Road Authority (HCTRA) roads. As of late 2003, the EZ TAG can also be used on all lanes of tolled roadways in Texas that accommodate electronic toll collection.
A microchip implant is an identifying integrated circuit placed under the skin of an animal. The chip, about the size of a large grain of rice, uses passive radio-frequency identification (RFID) technology, and is also known as a PIT tag. Standard pet microchips are typically 11–13 mm long and 2 mm in diameter.
Automatic identification and data capture (AIDC) refers to the methods of automatically identifying objects, collecting data about them, and entering them directly into computer systems, without human involvement. Technologies typically considered as part of AIDC include QR codes, bar codes, radio frequency identification (RFID), biometrics, magnetic stripes, optical character recognition (OCR), smart cards, and voice recognition. AIDC is also commonly referred to as "Automatic Identification", "Auto-ID" and "Automatic Data Capture".
Object hyperlinking is a term that refers to extending the Internet to objects and locations in the real world. Object hyperlinking aims to extend the Internet to the physical world by attaching tags with URLs to tangible objects or locations. These object tags can then be read by a wireless mobile device and information about objects and locations retrieved and displayed.
A label printer is a computer printer that prints on self-adhesive label material and/or card-stock (tags). A label printer with built-in keyboard and display for stand-alone use is often called a label maker. Label printers are different from ordinary printers because they need to have special feed mechanisms to handle rolled stock, or tear sheet (fanfold) stock. Common connectivity for label printers include RS-232 serial, Universal Serial Bus (USB), parallel, Ethernet and various kinds of wireless. Label printers have a wide variety of applications, including supply chain management, retail price marking, packaging labels, blood and laboratory specimen marking, and fixed assets management.
Bag tags, also known as baggage tags, baggage checks or luggage tickets, have traditionally been used by bus, train, and airline carriers to route checked luggage to its final destination. The passenger stub is typically handed to the passenger or attached to the ticket envelope:
to aid the passenger in identifying their bag among similar bags at the destination baggage carousel;
as proof—still requested at a few airports—that the passenger is not removing someone else's bag from the baggage reclaim hall; and
as a means for the passenger and carrier to identify and trace a specific bag that has gone astray and was not delivered at the destination. The carriers' liability is restricted to published tariffs and international agreements.
In the distribution and logistics of many types of products, track and trace or tracking and tracing concerns a process of determining the current and past locations of a unique item or property. Mass serialization is the process that manufacturers go through to assign and mark each of their products with a unique identifier such as an Electronic Product Code (EPC) for track and trace purposes. The marking or "tagging" of products is usually completed within the manufacturing process through the use of various combinations of human readable or machine readable technologies such as DataMatrix barcodes or RFID.
Intermec, Inc. was a manufacturer and supplier of automated identification and data capture equipment, including barcode scanners, barcode printers, mobile computers, RFID systems, voice recognition systems, and life cycle services.
A converter is a company that specializes in modifying or combining raw materials such as polyesters, adhesives, silicone, adhesive tapes, foams, plastics, felts, rubbers, liners and metals, as well as other materials, to create new products.
Mobile tagging is the process of providing data read from tags for display on mobile devices, commonly encoded in a two-dimensional barcode, using the camera of a camera phone as the reader device. The contents of the tag code is usually a URL for information addressed and accessible through Internet.
DASH7 Alliance Protocol (D7A) is an open-source wireless sensor and actuator network protocol, which operates in the 433 MHz, 868 MHz and 915 MHz unlicensed ISM/SRD band. DASH7 provides multi-year battery life, range of up to 2 km, low latency for connecting with moving things, a very small open-source protocol stack, AES 128-bit shared-key encryption support, and data transfer of up to 167 kbit/s. The DASH7 Alliance Protocol is the name of the technology promoted by the non-profit consortium called the DASH7 Alliance.
Ensurge Micropower ASA is a Norwegian microbattery manufacturing company with global headquarters, R&D offices, and flexible electronics manufacturing in San Jose, California, United States and corporate headquarters in Oslo. Ensurge designs, develops, and produces solid-state lithium battery (SSLB) products using roll-to-roll printing technology on stainless steel substrates.
Barcode technology in healthcare is the use of optical machine-readable representation of data in a hospital or healthcare setting.
The ucode system is an identification number system that can be used to identify things in the real world uniquely. Digital information can be associated with objects and places, and the associated information can be retrieved by using ucode.
A digital object memory (DOMe) is a digital storage space intended to keep permanently all related information about a concrete physical object instance that is collected during the lifespan of this object and thus forms a basic building block for the Internet of Things (IoT) by connecting digital information with physical objects.
Chipless RFID tags are RFID tags that do not require a microchip in the transponder.
Barcode library or Barcode SDK is a software library that can be used to add barcode features to desktop, web, mobile or embedded applications. Barcode library presents sets of subroutines or objects which allow to create barcode images and put them on surfaces or recognize machine-encoded text / data from scanned or captured by camera images with embedded barcodes. The library can support two modes: generation and recognition mode, some libraries support barcode reading and writing in the same way, but some libraries support only one mode.
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