Tiny HP memory chip pilots with big momentum
By Staff -- Manufacturing Business Technology, 10/1/2006 12:00:00 AM
Hewlett-Packard's (HP) experimental memory chip—branded the Memory Spot—isn't much bigger than a grain of rice, yet it holds a short audio or video clip, or a substantial amount of text. The wireless data chip needs no battery, can store up to 4 megabits of data in the working prototypes, and has a 10 megabits-per-second data transfer rate—thereby “freeing digital content from the electronic world of the PC and the Internet and arranging it all around us in the physical world,” say HP.
“We're doing pilots now to demonstrate the value of the Memory Spot, creating momentum behind it,” says Mohamed Dekhil, research manager at HP Labs, Palo Alto, Calif. “In three to five years we'll see wide use of it.”
One possible application is warranty verification.
“Warranty fraud is a big deal in manufacturing—especially for HP,” Dekhil says. “We lose millions in fraudulent claims. There's no system for managing the chain of where a product has been sold.”
HP is conducting a pilot wherein it is attaching the chip to the chassis of products. The chips contain not only the product serial number, but the model number and all the individual component parts that went into it. “A technician can quickly determine if any components have been changed,” says Dekhil.
Memory Spot also could be embedded in driver's licenses containing critical medical information; in cell phones, PDAs, cameras or other devices; or used for chain-of-custody pedigrees in pharmaceuticals. Though it could be a potential competitor to RFID—with considerably greater magnitude of data storage and faster data-transfer rates—device and infrastructure costs pose obstacles.
“The main thing is it can store large amounts of information about products, not just its ID,” says Dekhil. “It can store where it came from and a full history of where it's been without requiring another system.”
