Mark IV may have T3 tags in 2001

Mark IV may have prototypes of its multi-protocol transponder that it calls T3 (three transponders in one) available by the summer of 2001 and commercial sales before the end of the year. “It’s a very tight schedule but we are making good progress and pushing it very hard,” says Martin Capper VP at Mark IV IVHS. Capper says there’s a good market for the transponders which will work to three common electronic toll systems in use in north America: (1) the active IAG protocol of the northeast and midwest, (2) passive asynchronous Type 21 systems in use in California, Colorado, Kansas, Georgia and Florida (3) the open road active synchronous systems designed by Hughes and used for tolling in Toronto and in trucking applications. Only the original readers supplied by Amtech for its read-only type 1 transponders in use for tolling in Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma could not read the Mark IV T3. They use a proprietory set of protocols. New readers from TransCore/Amtech can handle Type 21 tags and therefore the T3s.

P1455 tag

The other selling point for the T3 tag will be that it will likely be the first to incorporate the new P1455 IEEE standard for the applications layer for transponders. P1455 – a scheme for managing applications for different uses of transponders – is regarded as the major accomplishment of the long FHWA-industry collaborative endeavor to get north American-wide vehicle-roadside communications standards. P1455 is being incorporated in the new blockbuster longrange 5.9GHz active transponder being designed by Dick Schnacke’s group that include his company TransCore/Amtech, Mark IV and Sirit. P1455 is likely to be incorporated into new Japanese systems. The use of P1455 will be mandated in new ITS applications getting federal funding.

That fits with T3 selling to truckers and other commercial vehicles. Mark IV is already selling a Fusion tag which fuses in one tag the active IAG and Hughes systems. T3 will be a much greater technical leap in integrating asynchronous passive backscatter technology with synchronized active systems. (Contact M Capper Mark IV 905 624 3025 mcapper@fpelectronics.com)