50kbits/s transponder circuit ‘world’s first’ of its kind

Holst Centre, together with imec and TNO, have developed an 8bit flexible transponder circuit on foil using pentacene as semiconductor material and a high-k gate dielectric. The development team says that the current drive of this technology enables a data rate of >50kbits/s for the circuit, which approaches Electronic Product Coding (EPC) bit rate specifications. Earlier versions of such organic circuits had a bit rate limited to 1-2kbits/s. The EPC standard has been developed for wireless identification in high volume logistics applications such as retail and it is widely used already today, for example on pallet level logistics. Because flexible circuits offer ruggedness during processing as well as in the final product, they are a property particularly suitable for new applications such as plastic rfid tags for object tagging. However, for widespread application, plastic rfid technology should adhere maximally to the standard EPC specifications for item level tagging. The standards require a bit rate of the order of 50kb/s. The researchers say that the next step is to use EPC tags on package level and on a longer term target on individual items. Organic electronic technology is a candidate for high volume and low cost manufacturing of simple electronic circuits. The results demonstrate that the technology could now be on the way to reach EPC compatibility.