China lagging behind in RFID standards

China has no definite frequency allocation and technical standards for RFID

China must standardise its use of Radio Frequency ID (RFID) technology if its market is to grow, an industry analyst has claimed.

The China RFID Market Study 2005-2006, carried out by analyst firm Research and Markets, warned that the country has no definite frequency allocation and technical standards for RFID. 

"RFID applications in logistics fields are mostly within the 860MHz-960MHz band, which stands in contradiction with the band adopted in China's telecoms industry," the report stated.

However, Research and Markets explained that there is no short-term solution because the RFID industry in China lacks a sound foundation and the technology requires improvements.

"Compared with developed countries, the technology and application of RFID in China are still in their early stages, especially in ultra-high frequency applications," the report claimed.

But the analyst firm found that, despite the higher costs, the application of ultra-high frequency RFID is progressing rapidly in China.

Research and Markets suggested that the development of standards and technologies would lead to large applications of ultra-high frequency RFID in 2008, pushing the market to 5.5 billion units by 2010.