Further boosts for Finnish RFID technology
Two further signs of the industrial and retail penetration of HF and UHF RFID tags, tickets and smart labels, have come from Finland (which for a small country has the enviable knack of pushing boundaries in niche, high technology products). The RFID division of UPM Raflatac recently doubled the production capacity of tags and inlays at its Jyväskylä production plant in the center of the country. The group also has a thriving RFID production plant in North Carolina serving global markets.
Another major Finnish producer is the Confidex Group, headquartered in Nokia (famous for its cell phones). It has attracted €5 million (US$6.66 million) of venture capital funding from Logispring, with offices in Geneva and New York, and a local investor Aura Capital. As Confidex’s first institutional round of equity, the investment will be spent on strengthening its sales and boosting manufacturing.
The group has operations in Europe, the USA and China. It specializes in contactless identification technology for industrial processes, supply chains, mass transit networks and retail pricing. It includes XinTag, a designer and manufacturer of RFID transponders for high volume systems. Last year Confidex began a five-year contract to supply 125 million RFID contactless limited use tickets for Guangshen Railway, run by the Chinese railways ministry. It was the largest single order for this type of RFID ticketing ever placed. The company subsequently established a XinTag subsidiary in Guangzhou.