An Oasis of Opportunity
February 2006
|
While many large label converters have plunged into RFID, small to mid-sized label companies are exploring whether the financial benefits are realizable or just a mirage.
RADIO FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION (RFID) is making waves in the tag and label industry. From any point of view, RFID has thoroughly and profoundly caught the attention of the entire industry.
Industry suppliers have spent the last few years making avenues into RFID. In that same time, converters and their customers have hit the books, per se, filling seats at the numerous RFID seminars, conferences, and trade shows to learn about the technology and how it applies to them.
Already, a larger converters have delved in to smart labels, adding RFID converting capabilities to their shp floors and helping consumer product companies meet mandates set by Wal-Mart and the Department of Defense, among others. A few converter have even gone as far as recreating themselves as vertically inclined smart label producers with the help of technology and customer partnerships.
All eyes are on RFID, and why shouldn't they be? Market forecasts are intoxicating.
In the 60 or so years since RFID precursors were invented, 2.4 billion RFID tags have been sold, according to a new study by IDTechEx, called "RFID Forecasts, Players and Opportunities 2006-2016." Of that total, IDTechEx reports that 600 million tags were sold in 2005 and that another 1.3 billion tags are expected to be sold this year alone.
In addition, including tags, readers, services and other associated technologies, IDTechEx anticipates RFID to be a $2.71 billion market in 2006, rising to $12.35 billion by 2010—that's nearly $10 billion in four years and that doesn't include the full potential expected when item-level tagging becomes mainstream.
While not all of the profit will go to converters, new and undiscovered business opportunities exist for the tag and label industry.
"Item level tagging of retail goods is in the main a long time away, but there are label opportunities in other markets amounting to billions and tens of billions of tags needed per year per application, such as electronic passport inserts, books, drug labeling, healthcare records, postal, etc.," said Raghu Das, CEO, IDTechEx. "This even extends to labels that users would pay $8 for, such as Airbus where they need a large amount of memory and long lasting tags—more expensive substrates and encapsulation. However, this and other [markets] are unsupplied, as few are looking at the full range of diverse RFID markets that need RFID labels."
RADIO FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION (RFID) is making waves in the tag and label industry. From any point of view, RFID has thoroughly and profoundly caught the attention of the entire industry.
Industry suppliers have spent the last few years making avenues into RFID. In that same time, converters and their customers have hit the books, per se, filling seats at the numerous RFID seminars, conferences, and trade shows to learn about the technology and how it applies to them.
Already, a larger converters have delved in to smart labels, adding RFID converting capabilities to their shp floors and helping consumer product companies meet mandates set by Wal-Mart and the Department of Defense, among others. A few converter have even gone as far as recreating themselves as vertically inclined smart label producers with the help of technology and customer partnerships.
All eyes are on RFID, and why shouldn't they be? Market forecasts are intoxicating.
In the 60 or so years since RFID precursors were invented, 2.4 billion RFID tags have been sold, according to a new study by IDTechEx, called "RFID Forecasts, Players and Opportunities 2006-2016." Of that total, IDTechEx reports that 600 million tags were sold in 2005 and that another 1.3 billion tags are expected to be sold this year alone.
In addition, including tags, readers, services and other associated technologies, IDTechEx anticipates RFID to be a $2.71 billion market in 2006, rising to $12.35 billion by 2010—that's nearly $10 billion in four years and that doesn't include the full potential expected when item-level tagging becomes mainstream.
While not all of the profit will go to converters, new and undiscovered business opportunities exist for the tag and label industry.
"Item level tagging of retail goods is in the main a long time away, but there are label opportunities in other markets amounting to billions and tens of billions of tags needed per year per application, such as electronic passport inserts, books, drug labeling, healthcare records, postal, etc.," said Raghu Das, CEO, IDTechEx. "This even extends to labels that users would pay $8 for, such as Airbus where they need a large amount of memory and long lasting tags—more expensive substrates and encapsulation. However, this and other [markets] are unsupplied, as few are looking at the full range of diverse RFID markets that need RFID labels."
Companies Mentioned:
 |
|
|
|||
|
|
|
Chemistry for the Graphic Arts
What the Printer Should Know About Paper