NXP – UHF IC Is Supports Multiple Inlay Providers For Global Supply Chain Management Applications

NXP Semiconductors has announced that its industry-leading UCODE 7 UHF IC, which set new industry standards for performance, versatility and speed when introduced in 2013, is now the solution of choice for multiple inlay providers supporting global supply chain management applications. Major inlay providers are now able to offer a single form-factor and fully-compliant tagging solution to retailers wanting to streamline large scale, international operations. Used in RFID-enabled supply chain applications, NXP’s UCODE 7 UHF IC offers unprecedented broadband read and write performance covering all University of Arkansas’ Radio Compliance (ARC) Center categories – A, B, C, D, I and K.

Having a single form factor inlay that meets both FCC (Federal Communications Commission) and ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute) frequency regulations offers huge benefits and flexibility to retailers, brand owners and suppliers in their worldwide supply chain. To ensure compatibility the Arkansas Radio Compliance (ARC) Center tests inlays against technical performance specs for the various regions. Categories A, B, C and D cover all US FCC frequency regulations for different apparel types, while categories I and K cover European regulations, says the company.

Justin Patton, director of research at University of Arkansas’ RFID Research Center, said: “With current efforts to update European regulations to allow for alignment with US RFID frequencies in the near future, we are seeing a surge in interest amongst retailers and product manufacturers for ‘Global’ RFID tags. ‘Global’ tags are qualified by ARC for performance in Europe and the US, and typically source tagged in Asia, Central, and South America. Moving to global tags is critical to RFID adoption; now we are truly seeing international alignment in technology and cooperation amongst retailers and product manufacturers in tagging solutions. Currently NXP’s UCODE 7 IC is integrated into Avery Dennison’s AD-235u7, Checkpoint’s Zephyr 2 and Triumph 2, and Smartrac’s latest version of their Web and Belt UCODE 7 inlays, and are all approved for ARC categories A, B, and D, which cover various product types and store environments in the US frequency band. They are also approved for ARC Categories I and K, which cover various products and store environments in the allowed European frequency range.”

Suresh Palliparambil, director of sales, Americas, NXP Semiconductors, added: “NXP’s global approach to RFID apparel tagging greatly simplifies operations for many major retailers and brands. Now that many of NXP’s partners offer inlays that can be used on any category for any region, it is no longer necessary to consider multiple tagging solutions to maintain high performance on a regional basis. UCODE 7 solutions drastically simplify both inlay procurement and inlay inventory management while also significantly reducing operating costs.”

In addition to a selection of true global tags, NXP’s inlay partners now offer UCODE 7 based inlays in form factors as small as 41.4mm x 16mm while still meeting high performance demands of categories such as Denim (ARC Category A), says the company.