Philips Research Press Releases - Philips demonstrates world-first technical feasibility of 13.56-MHz RFID tags based on plastic electronics

Eindhoven, the Netherlands - Scientists at Philips Research have created a fully functional 13.56 MHz RFID tag based entirely on plastic electronics. In contrast to conventional silicon-chip-based RFID tags, a plastic electronics RFID chip can be printed directly onto a plastic substrate along with an antenna without involving complex assembly steps. This could pave the way for the packaging industry to replace existing barcodes by a low-cost RFID tag that provides individual packages with a unique item-level identification code – something not feasible with current barcode technology.

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) is an automatic identification method, based on remotely retrieving information via radio waves from miniature electronic circuits called RFID tags. Philips has now realized the first plastic-electronics-based tag that is capable of transmitting multi-bit digital identification codes at 13.56 MHz – the dominant industry-standard radio frequency for RFID tag applications. As an additional demonstrator for the technology, scientists at Philips Research have also developed a 64-bit code generator, showing the practicality of building plastic electronic circuits with the complexity required for item-level tagging.

Performance results for these circuits will be presented at this year’s International Solid-State Circuits Conference (ISSCC, February 5-9, San Francisco, CA, USA) in a paper that will also be awarded the conference’s Beatrice Winner Award for Editorial Excellence.

Being a world leader in the RFID business, Philips supplies silicon-based components for applications such as supply chain management, public transport, pharmaceuticals and animal tracking. Current silicon-based tags have excellent performance, and when produced in volume, can be manufactured at low cost. Philips is also conducting research into plastic-electronics-based RFID tags, since these tags have the potential to be manufactured in a radically different way, namely via even lower-cost reel-to-reel and other in-line processing techniques.

“The realization of plastic RFID tags that operate at 13.56 MHz is a precursor for wide-scale market acceptance in the coming years”, says Dr. Leo Warmerdam, Senior Director at Philips Research. “To speed up commercialization of our technology we will explore co-development options with third parties”.

Philips Research has more than ten years of experience in the field of organic electronics, which has resulted in many scientific publications and patents. Next to the rollable displays of Philips Polymer Vision and recently demonstrated polymer memories, RFID tags are the third application area for organic electronics being developed by Philips. The plastic RFID tag results being presented at this year’s ISSCC are derived partly from Philips participation in the PoliTag project, which is funded by the German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), and partly from Philips participation in the 6th European Framework Programme project PolyApply.

High-resolution pictures are available from:

+ www.research.philips.com/newscenter/pictures/
060206-rfid-pict.html

Scientists at Philips Research have developed a plastic RFID chip that is as thin as paper and no larger than a postage stamp.

Philips’ plastic-electronics-based RFID tag is capable of transmitting multi-bit digital identification codes at 13.56 MHz, the dominant industry-standard radio frequency for RFID tag applications.

For further information please contact:

Steve Klink
Communications Department Philips Research
Tel.: +31 40 27 43703
Mobile: +31 6 10888824
E-mail: steve.klink@philips.com

About Royal Philips Electronics

Royal Philips Electronics of the Netherlands (NYSE: PHG, AEX: PHI) is a diversified Health and Well-being company, focused on improving people’s lives through timely innovations. As a world leader in healthcare, lifestyle and lighting, Philips integrates technologies and design into people-centric solutions, based on fundamental customer insights and the brand promise of “sense and simplicity”. Headquartered in the Netherlands, Philips employs approximately 133,000 employees in more than 60 countries worldwide. With sales of EUR 27 billion in 2007, the company is a market leader in cardiac care, acute care and home healthcare, energy efficient lighting solutions and new lighting applications, as well as lifestyle products for personal well-being and pleasure with strong leadership positions in flat TV, male shaving and grooming, portable entertainment and oral healthcare. News from Philips is located at www.philips.com/newscenter.